Round Bend Press: Insulted

Round Bend Press: Insulted:

Founding publisher Terry Simons is not happy with Bob Hicks' reference, in his generous review of my new novel,  to Round Bend Press as "small." I don't intend to get in the middle of what seems to me to be a semantic issue but I hope the occasion sparks awareness of the incredible revolution going on in the publishing industry today, much of which is scrutinized at the excellent blog The Passive Voice.

I applaud the vision of Simons at Round Bend Press and cherish my association with him. RBP published my last three books, each of which I consider important in my career: In My Old Age: Poems, which sets the theme for all my later work; Eight Oregon Plays, which brings together the work for which I'm best known regionally (not internationally); and Sodom, Gomorrah & Jones, the closest thing I'll ever write to a "swan song." None of these are commercial products. Round Bend Press is not in the commercial book business, though the culture at large, perhaps more than ever, still equates quality with a product's monetary life.

Simons and others have taken advantage of new technology to make quality work readily available that would have remained hidden by the rules of the prior print technology. This is not a bad thing. This is a revolution that should be applauded.

I think Hicks would agree and that his use of "small" was not meant to be pejorative but a literal statement of physical size.