Christian Peet’s THE NINES Book II: Pluto ~ Never Forget.

I’ve had this project in the works for a long (far too long) time, and I’m beyond excited to see the work into the world. Christian has shown real patience in remaining committed to my painfully slow progress (ever try watching sap run down a tree?), and I’m grateful and honored to work with him and his smart & humorous but ultimately urgent manuscript.

A couple weeks ago I traveled down to San Marcos, TX (225 miles south of Dallas) to team up with Clifton Riley and print the covers for the new book. We spent the better part of the morning collaborating on the design before working late into the night screen printing what, in my opinion, turned out to be a striking cover (click for a closer look).

I also had a chance to cut all the book board, so I’m in pretty good shape to push through the run. I’m working on cutting/folding everything, and I hope to have the project finished sometime next month. The edition will be 26 hardcovers (numbered and signed) and 50 softbacks. I haven’t settled on a price yet, but I’m striving to make it as reasonable as possible.

Again, I couldn’t be more excited to work on this book. It’s a gem and is sure to make a positive contribution to Interbirth’s slowly growing list of titles. Thanks, Christian!

Here is a brief author’s bio (taken from Christian’s web site: www.christianpeet.com):

Christian Peet is the author of a cross-genre collection of “postcards,” Big American Trip (Shearsman Books, 2009), as well as two chapbook-installments of his ongoing project, The Nines— Pluto: Never Forget, which is forthcoming from Interbirth Books, and The Nines (Book 1), which is published by from Palm Press. His work appears in magazines such as Action Yes and Denver Quarterly, and in anthology, A Best Of FENCE: The First Nine Years.

He is also the publisher and founding editor of Tarpaulin Sky Press, disseminating hybrid forms and innovative poetry and prose in trade paperback and hand-bound books as well as in literary journals in print and online.

An adjunct lecturer by choice (or so he says), he taught Poetry I & II, Creative Writing, and Landmarks of Literature at Brooklyn College and at Hunter College, for the City University of New York (CUNY), until moving to Vermont, where he teaches Creative Writing, Poetry, Women and Literature, and Intro to Literature at the Community College of Vermont, in addition to running Tarpaulin Sky Press and freelancing as a web and book designer. He received a BA from Bennington College, a MFA from Goddard College, and has driven across the country half a dozen times and camped in all but five states while living out of his car and assuming a variety of employee incarnations including sheet metal fabricator, goat milker, organic sprout grower, maintenance man, landscaper, and convenience store clerk.

I went out to Manor on Monday and looked at the press. It was being stored in a warehouse facility and seemed to be in pretty good shape. Dirty? Yes. Rusty? A little rust here and there, but not nearly as bad as the photo made it appear. And it worked! We plugged it into a regular old extension cord, turned it on, and watched it hum into motion. Everything moved smoothly and, after a close examination, I couldn’t find anything wrong with the press at all.

I left Manor really wanting to get my hands on this little beauty, but — though $750 is a good price for a functional letterpress — I’m flat broke. Being a graduate student doesn’t pay well (or at all in some cases), and I’m lucky just to break even with my Interbirth projects. I’m also trying to take care of a wife and son, and $750 letterpresses aren’t in the family budget. But having a press is one of my goals, so I wrote the press’s owner, Ben Sargent of Sargent Brothers Typography & Printing, and offered him $250 and an explanation of my financial situation and work with Interbirth Books. Almost immediately Ben offered to sell me the press for the generous price of $300, even being so kind as to offer me a payment plan. Needless to say, I jumped at the offer and agreed to buy the press.

The next day I drove over to Ben’s house and made the transaction. He gave me a feedboard and two chases and showed me his workshop. Tucked away in a backhouse is a C & P 10×12 press circa 1904, tons of type and furniture/drawers, a heavy-duty antique paper cutter, shelves of handset books, and a model train all immaculate and in perfect order. He gave me a few of the items he’s printed (an anthology of railroad songs/poems; a little book containing Jonah and Father Mapple’s sermon on Jonah from Melville’s Moby Dick; the Sargent Brothers’ Specimen Book of Type & Ornaments; and a piece of ephemera that reads, “In the City of Washington stands a statue of old Ben Franklin, its square pedestal inscribed on each side with one of the great man’s noble distinctions. One the back and sides are engraved Patriot, Philosopher, Philanthropist. But it is the front which bears the word PRINTER“) and offered to trade knowledge at some point in the future, even suggesting we collaborate on a project in the future. I think I’ll take you up on that, Ben.

After getting some good moving advice from Kyle Schlesinger, I rented a flatbed truck with a lift gate and picked up the press. Roy at R&L Transfer loaded the press onto the truck with a forklift, and my brother-in-law Lewis Melendez and I strapped it down and hit the road. Four hours later we rolled into Dallas with the press, met up with my cohort Fred Seigmund, and set to work unloading the press. After lifting it with a simple pallet jack and forcing it over to the lift gate, we discovered that the pallet wouldn’t fit squarely on the platform but would have to hang over a bit in order to clear the bed of the truck — a risky and dangerous situation. However, out of pure excitement and its accompanying stupidity we decided to give it a try despite the risk. As soon as the pallet started to go over the edge, things got scary real fast. I could feel the pallet jack start to roll away from me, and Fred and Lewis started screaming “It’s going! It’s going!” With my heart dead in my chest I jumped off the truck, started the engine, and hit the switch to lower the lift gate. Lucky for everyone involved, the gate lowered smoothly and the press was safely on the ground.

We swung the press around, reinforced the pallet with some 4×4s, picked up some wings and beers, and rested up for the trip back to Austin. After almost 8 hours of driving the next day, I was back in Dallas again, cleaning up my new press. I’ve got a lot of work to do (all cosmetic), but things are cleaning up pretty nicely. The pictures/video here are the press before I did anything to it, but I’ll continue to post images of its restoration in progress. Until then . . .

To get a sense of what we’re working with, visit the online tour through Dr. White’s latest exhibit: Invention & Discovery: Printed Books from 15th Century Europe. The site is surprisingly well put together and offers a solid yet brief introduction to the complexities of incunabula. The exhibit covers the development of print in Mainz; the various print traditions in Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, France, and England; 15th century bindings; and the roles of authors, readers, and even librarians in the development of early print culture. Well worth a quick visit.

Again, I’m lucky to be able to handle so many of these items. There’s no substitute for hands-on learning when it comes to bibliographical and textual studies, and I’d be hard pressed to think of a collection that offers more in the way of unique early books than the Bridwell.

blog: micahrobbins.com (if you’re linked to loco et tempore, please switch the url to the new page)

Interbirth: interbirthbooks.com & interbirthbooks.org

New from Interbirth Books — Richard Owens: Embankments.

Seventy-five books (twenty-six of which are lettered A through Z) were designed, printed, assembled, and hand bound 100% in-house by Micah Robbins and Clifton Riley at Interbirth Books. The stitch is a buttonhole. The cover is an original screen / litho print.

43 pages — 5 1/16 in x 7 3/8 in. — $15 (free shipping in the US)

Visit www.interbirthbooks.org to see more photos and to purchase.