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the synaesthesia press

synaesthesia press

In 1998 I walked into Norman Hicks shop south of Market Street in San Francisco and bought some stuff. I had no idea what I was buying, nor what I was about to get myself into.

Let me quote the greatest living American poet:

“In Dispraise Of Poetry”

When the King of Siam disliked a courtier,
he gave him a beautiful white elephant.
The miracle beast deserved such ritual
that to care for him properly meant ruin.
Yet to care for him improperly was worse.
It appears the gift could not be refused.

Jack Gilbert

I certainly don’t have a gift, but I certainly feel like I’ve got my white elephant: a 2500 pound piece of machinery…among other things. Norman also sold me a Chandler and Price paper cutter (300 pounds), and along the way I’ve accumulated another ton or two (literally) of equipment — ranging from type and ornaments, to slugs and spacing material…to two more presses (both Chandler & Prices (a 3″ x 5″ and a Pilot))…to all sorts of stuff I won’t even mention.

Like the press the movers dropped…and smashed.

But I’m making the thing I love most.

The synaesthesia press is a Vandercook #219, along with what I just mentioned earlier: both smaller C & P’s.

I dunno. Maybe I should have included this in the “about” page.

I think the hardest thing about having the Vandercook is simply having it. It is The White Elephant, and they’re becoming quite valuable. In 1998 I paid $600 for mine (which included the biggest PatMag in the bed of the press, price included!) and I just saw one go on eBay for $6000.

But it’s a great machine. It’s a machine that will, indeed, kill Fascists. It has in the past; this is fact.

There are others that have done so.

Woody Guthrie

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Happy Birthday Jerry Salinger!

JD Salinger

JD Salinger just turned 90. That makes him twice as old and me; or, better yet, I’m 1/2 way to being an old, old man.

Better yet?

Anyway, I don’t know why, but (probably) just like you, The Catcher in the Rye really spoke to me, in the same way all great art does: Duchamp and Warhol, Coltrane and Miles, Lennon & McCartney, Kerouac and the Beats, Bukowski and rogue poets who starve themselves in order to keep writing poems.

I actually like 9 Stories better than Catcher. Well, wait a sec. Lemme think about that.

Depending on my mood, I like 9 Stories more than Catcher in the Rye. Like I said, just depends on my mood.

And really I love the whole idea of Salinger — for lack of a better term. Or a way to put it.

Salinger writes dismissible fiction for Post WWII pop rags, then gets a story or two into “The New Yorker”, and then he drops his masterpiece on us all. It was about that time some high school kids used to saunter up to his compound in Cornish, New Hampshire, just to hang out and listen to jazz records. And one of them asked “Jerry” for an interview in her school newspaper. Salinger agreed, which scored the girl one of the great literary interviews of all time.

Great, of course, in the sense that it was the first — and last — Salinger ever gave.

The girl’s journalism teacher knew it was something, cause it didn’t wind up in the school’s newspaper, but in the city’s paper, and that was the last time those kids were ever allowed into his house again.

And that’s the last time anyone ever heard from JD Salinger…to this day.

Which was 50 years ago — give or take.

For a while photographers and fans would make the trip to Cornish just to catch a glimpse. Or maybe even get a picture. There’s a Life magazine article from about the time Franny & Zooey was published of Salinger clamoring down a hill holding two pails of what I assumed was water from a well.

But maybe not.

I once heard a picture was floating around of him waving off a photographer on the way to his favorite (and probably only) doughnut shop in Cornish…but I never saw it.

The pic I found here came from this article at the New York Times on his birthday…which promoted me to blog Salinger. I’m willing to bet this photo came from the same session as the one that graces the back cover (but only in the first few printings) of The Catcher…

And I’ll admit Salinger’s reclusive behavior — as well as his lack of publications — is what makes me want more. It makes us all want more. Cause, let’s face it…if Salinger wrote a whole bunch of crummy novels and, late in his life, wound up selling Beanie Babies on QVC to make a few bucks, well…you know.

Just like if Jim Morrison woulda made it through that Paris night and found Jesus…a few years after making a couple bad solo records.

I wrote to Salinger once. It was right before I made Enemies and Friends. I actually wrote to two of my favorite writers (at that time) and asked them if I could publish a chapbook of their work. In addition to the letter, I sent Salinger a copy of the Harold Norse chapbook, Sniffing Keyholes, as well as Gifford’s The Strangest One of All. Of course I didn’t hear back from Salinger.

I did hear back from Tim O’Brien.

But I digress. In fact, I dunno what my point is here at all. I guess just to wish Salinger a happy birthday, even though I imagine him huddled around a fire, wrapped in a heavy quilt, and contemplating his life…and certainly not sitting in front of a computer, checking his e-mail, and Google’ing himself just to see if anyone cares anymore.

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A Chandler & Price Smashed to Bits.

A few years ago Karla Elling, of The Mummy Mountain Press, gave me an old style Chandler & Price platen press; the only catch in the deal was I had to move it.

This sort of catch is common in the letterpress world. Maybe not giving something away, but certainly moving it once you’ve bought it…whether it’s a press, a bunch of type, or whatever. It just seems everything weighs a ton (sometimes literally) when it comes to printing machinery, and this press I acquired was no exception.

But I got it moved to my studio, and sure it was a hassle, but with a few friends, a pick-up truck, and some metal pipes to act as rollers, we managed just fine.

The press cleaned up well. A beauty. But it was missing parts, and I knew that going into the deal. It turned out to be a lesson learned, as I never was able to find the parts I needed to make it work.

Then the move to Los Angeles.

I haven’t talked about that…yet. But then again I’ve totally neglected this blog — as well as All Things synaesthesia — for quite some time.

So I’ll start now.

Paying attention, that is.

I’ve moved to Los Angeles; the synaesthesia press has, too.

Moving a studio full of stuff that weighs a ton is no easy feat, but I managed. Almost. I hired some day laborers. I had help from family. And I hired professional movers for two pieces of equipment: a Vandercook #219 and the Old Style C & P.

The Vandy made it.

The C & P didn’t.

The C & P has a flywheel that makes it side-heavy, for lack of a better term. Professional Movers pick it up with a big old forklift, and as they’re backing out, the forklift hits a small hole in my driveway, causing the forklift to sway, and the press just fell.

That’s the best I can do…as far as explaining how it all went down.

Ain’t it just grand to watch a beautiful machine that’s lasted 100+ years come crashing down on your clock?

I couldn’t even bring myself to take pictures.

The press ended up at a scrap heap; my bill was waived; the studio is now up and running in Los Angeles.

And — like a bear rising slowly from a long slumber — the synaesthesia press is starting to wake up.

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In Memoriam :: Allan Milkerit

About 2 hours ago I found out my good friend Allan Milkerit died; he passed a little over a year ago. Allan was a San Francisco Bookman.

Allan Milkerit taught me books.

He was one of the best.

I met him while I was in grad school; he was running the show on the third floor of a building in the Mission District of San Francisco. You’d never know it was a building full of books, cause the ground floor was a paint store, and the neighborhood wasn’t the kind you’d think of when you thought about used books.

Does that make any sense?

I had some student loan money, so I started scouting books as a job…and I needed a place to sell them. Allan was, for all intensive purposes, running the show at a place called “Tall Stories”. It was a used book co-op, right down the hall from the great Bolerium Books, as well as Meyer Boswell. Bolerium sells Leftist / Commie / Gay / Socialist Literature, and Boswell sells important and antiquarian books on Law.

The first time I met Allan, he was behind the counter, and he was schooling someone on Ed Abbey first editions. The next time I went in there, I built up the nerve to ask Allan if I could rent 3 shelves for my stuff.

He sized me up and asked my area of specialization.

“Modern firsts,” I said.

He scoffed and said something like, “join the club.”

We became fast friends. He even made some space for me in his glass case, where he kept the good stuff. I hadn’t even been there a week.

Soon, Fridays became “Meat On A Stick” day, and we’d hit some of The Mission’s classier joints for just that: meat…on a stick.

Or pizza.

Or burritos.

Usually with John, who collected baseball books, and was Allan’s friend to the end.

One of my best scores as a bookman came one day when this nutty dude who used to edit a zine dedicated to jazz music came into Tall Stories on a day I manned the counter. If you manned the counter, you got to buy. Nutty Dude had six letters William S. Burroughs had written to him, and they were great. The best one was a two page letter that started out something like this: The Last Three-Toed Sloth seen alive was hanging from a tree in Brazil before the white man put a bullet in its head…

Of course I’m remembering a letter that I read over a decade ago, so I’m sure it didn’t say that exactly, and I gladly paid Nutty Dude the $140 he wanted for the lot of 6 letters. Allan walked in, looked at them, offered me $400, and I gladly sold: I really thought I was doing great turning a $260 profit in 10 minutes.

Do I need to tell you how The Superior Bookman did with his buy?

Allan knew — and loved — Ed Abbey, photoplay editions, Ferlinghetti’s Pocket Poets series (the only known complete run sat on a shelf in Allan’s bedroom), everything about Ann Tyler, and movies.

Allan loved the movies.

Allan drove me crazy, too: half-filled cups of coffee so old they looked like a science project; his stubborn behaviors; his ability to kick my ass in the Frisbee Game we used to play in the hall when no one was around.

I wish I could figure out how time works, and how I can go so long without calling an old friend to see how he’s doing, but how it can seem like yesterday we hung out, and ate Meat On A Stick, and talked about how the internet was killing the Independent Book Store, and how he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to survive.

I just wish I would have been there more for him.

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Volta

volta1-01.jpg

Volta is my homage to Wallace Berman.

It’s also an assemblage and a little magazine that’s published whenever I can make it happen.

I named it after James Joyce’s one and only (failed) business venture. It was called The Volta Theater. The Volta was located at 45 Mary Street in Dublin. Opened in 1909, it was Ireland’s very first movie house. Although the very first movie to ever screen in Ireland didn’t take place at The Volta. Which is probably why it failed? I mean it takes a really shitty businessman to open a movie theater in 1909 only to have it fail. Thank goodness. What if The Volta was a success?

Some have even claimed The Volta as myth, as far as it being Ireland’s very first movie house, but that really doesn’t matter, does it?

The first issue of Volta was published in an edition of 50 copies, all of which were sent to the friends, the enemies, and the heroes of the synaesthesia press.

Essentially Volta is a junk shop of sorts, as I take whatever paper scraps I have laying around from completed projects, found scrap paper from thrift stores, and various found objects that I’ve yet to use, and then I just run ’em through one of my presses — after I set the type and proofed it all.

Contents for the first Volta include poems by Bukowski, Brautigan, Litzsky, Denander, and Catlin; there’s one of the many “overs” I had in my archives of the Childish woodcuts that accompanied “The Strangest One of All“, as well as an assemblage / found piece by Jim Pritchard.

John Martin called Volta a “brilliant little piece of publishing”, which made me squeal like a little girl; I squealed a bit louder when he sent me 6 Bukowski poems for future issues.

You can’t buy a copy. It simply arrives at your door.

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Johnny Brewton

So I’m walking down Mission Street with Jack Micheline. It was the winter of ’96, I think. I had just met Jack a few weeks earlier at The Adobe Bookshop, where I had bought some of his paintings.

We developed a fast friendship, probably cause whatever Jack handed me, I’d buy.

Anyway, Jack brings up this cat doing some pretty remarkable work. Some chapbooks. Some broadsides. And something called X-Ray magazine.

I didn’t know anything about any Johnny Brewton, and Jack found that pretty hard to believe. Looking back at it now, so do I.

Jack said, in that drawn-out sort of way he had when he spoke, “you mean you don’t know Johnny Brewton? Ohhhh mannnn, you gotta see his work!”

A few months later I was poking around Kayo! Books when I came across the recently published X-Ray #6. I remember flipping through it and thinking superlative thoughts. And it really made me wonder about the work I was doing. Up to that point, I was basically running chappies off a copy machine. When I saw X Ray, I knew I had to step up my game. I immediately paid for it and set off to meet Johnny, and see what he was all about.

At that time, he worked at a used record store in the Haight. By then we had exchanged a few letters, and one afternoon I jumped on the #7 and made my way up to Recycled Records.

When I asked the dude behind the counter for Johnny, he gave me the sort of look you’d give an undercover cop.

Our meeting was pretty uneventful, except Johnny was kind and courteous, and we had some things in common, and it was the beginning of a friendship that’s closing in on a decade, now.

Johnny ended up designing two books for synaesthesia: Barry Gifford’s The Strangest One of All and Hal Norse’s Sniffing Keyholes.

Those two books were a departure for synaesthesia. I was a mimeo guy before, but meeting Johnny and having him design those two books would mean a change for me; I just upped the ante a bit with Johnny’s help, you know? At least I’d like to think I did.

X-Ray Book Co. is still making great books, and I’m still watching.

And buying.

And learning.

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Charles Bukowski — 4 Poets

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the synaesthesia press published an essay on the state of American Poetry according to Mr. Charles Bukowski. It appeared in synaesthesia press chap book #2, 4 Poets. The chap book is long out of print.

Bukowski wrote the essay in 1964. It was discovered in an old notebook that’s in the special collections department at the University of Arizona’s library. It’s in one of those 39 cent spiral-bound notebooks you buy for school. There’s beer stains and doodles all over it, and most of the contents are random thoughts and the kind of rants you’d find in someone’s personal journal. And right in the middle is this great essay.

So without asking anyone’s permission, I published it.

John Martin didn’t like it. But he bought almost the entire run. Maybe he’s got some laying around, but I wouldn’t know.

Every once in a while a copy shows up on eBay, but I’m not the seller. Because I don’t have anymore left; besides, I promised Black Sparrow no more sales.

In the same notebook was the first draft — in Buk’s hand — of “The Day It Snowed in L.A.” It was published almost 20+ years later, and almost verbatim, as what sits in that notebook.

I found the cover illustration I took for my book in that notebook, too.

I can’t tell you how excited I was to hold that notebook in my hands. It was a special experience I don’t think I could ever relive, cause I’m 20 years older now, and those sorts of feelings have long left me.

There were 243 copies printed; in addition, I printed 11 special copies that had another essay called “The House of Horrors” tipped in. The 11 copies were printed using 11 variant covers, all different mock-ups I had in mind for the regular edition.

Oh — “The House of Horrors” was in that same notebook, too.

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Billy Childish — The Strangest One of All

Johnny Brewton introduced me to Billy Childish.

Billy Childish is a musician/poet/artist. And, instead of writing something up here on my own, I took this straight from his website: “A cult figure in America, Europe and Japan, Billy Childish is by far the most prolific painter, poet, and song-writer of his generation. In a twenty year period he has published 30 collections of his poetry, recorded over 70 full-length independent LP’s and produced over 1000 paintings.

Born in 1959 in Chatham, Kent. Billy Childish left Secondary education at 16 an undiagnosed dyslexic. Refused an interview at the local art school he entered the Naval Dockyard at Chatham as an apprentice stonemason. During the following six months (the artist’s only prolonged period of employment), he produced some six hundred drawings in ‘the tea huts of hell. On the basis of this work he was accepted into St Martin’s School of Art to study painting. However, his acceptance was short-lived and before completing the course he was expelled for his outspokenness and unorthodox working methods. With no qualifications and no job prospects Childish then spent some 12 years ‘painting on the dole’, developing his own highly personal writing style and producing his art independently.

My name is Billy Childish. I was diagnosed dyslexic when I was 28.
I have published 30 collections of poetry and 2 novels. I have made about 100 independent LP records and painted over 2000 paintings. When I was 17 I had a bank account under the name of Kurt Schwitters. I lived on the dole for 15 years.

I am self taught.
I do not like fashion culture.
I do not hate anyone.”

Billy created the woodcuts for Barry Gifford’s The Strangest One of All. Every woodcut is the same subject — William S. Burroughs — the subject of Barry’ s book.

There’s a single woodcut of WSB peering through the die-cut window on the cover of the chappie; and, if you have the edition of 26 lettered copies, you got two bonus woodcuts of WSB, all wrapped up in a nice manila envelope.

Billy fondly calls William Burroughs “the old duffer”; I think that’s pretty funny.