During the course of his Stegner Fellowship, Edwards completed a few projects of his own. This year, Noemi Press published Campeche, his poetic collaboration with his photographer father. And Edwards' translation of María Baranda's Ficticia (Shearsman Books) was recently nominated for a 2011 Northern California Book Award.
"It's not going out on a limb at all," said Edwards, to point to the Stegner Fellowship as "bolstering my interest in rogue elements in the poetry world — people who were both tastemakers and went against the grain."
But Canarium wasn't founded as a mouthpiece for one literary approach. The press was meant to serve as a book-length soapbox for poets the editors had known for years but who hadn't yet found a publishing deal. Beer and Buffam both published in The Canary — the literary magazine Edwards and Twemlow ran for six years before Canarium.
Once Edwards' alma mater — the University of Michigan MFA Program in Creative Writing — began to provide financial and editorial staff support, the editors were able to position the press as a publishing advocate.
"It's a cliché, but that's why the press has almost a family feeling," said Edwards.
And like a family, Canarium and its authors travel with each other. Following a business model unchanged by either critical attention or e-commerce, the publishing house still makes most of its sales by hawking copies during book tours.
Now, just off a 13-stop trip along the West Coast, Canarium is gearing up for a series of Midwestern appearances. Edwards and a few of his authors will hit the road together, reading at a new town each night — "like a rock band," as he put it. "Except that we're in bed before midnight."
Edwards will return to Stanford in the fall as the William Chace Poetry Lecturer in Continuing Studies.
(Photo: Linda A. Cicero / Stanford News Service)
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