Publishing: Anna Carey welcomes a new Irish imprint.
In 2003, Declan Meade interviewed Derry-born writer Sean O'Reilly for the Stinging Fly, the literary magazine founded by Meade in 1998.
O'Reilly had just finished writing The Swing of Things, the dark and lyrical second novel that would prove his biggest success to date. Two years after that interview, Meade is publishing O'Reilly's latest piece of writing, Watermark - a collaboration born during a chance meeting at Christmas 2004.
"I'd just finished Watermark when I ran into Declan on the street," says O'Reilly. They chatted about what they were doing and decided to join forces on a new project - Watermark would be the first book published by The Stinging Fly Press, Meade's new publishing imprint. It's a short work of fiction that could be described as a prose poem or a novella, although that's not how its author sees it. He prefers to describe it simply as "a piece of work".
Writing is about listening to the character, and each character's voice takes different shapes, says O'Reilly. "I didn't sit down with a shape in mind, but as I was writing it I was aware of what for me is an erotic indeterminacy of form. It's an attempt to make a space between a novel and a poem. The market is often too quick to label things - this goes on the fiction shelf, that goes on the poetry shelf. The market makes those concepts, but you can take those concepts to task as well. And the indeterminacy is part of this book."
Meade has no desire to fix labels to his authors, and ever since he founded the Stinging Fly magazine, he has always wanted to move into book publishing.
"We're about giving new writers a chance," he says. "They need more than the magazine. Some are at a stage when they need to move on to the next thing, and the next thing is a book. When I see those writers and know they have the work but that it's not getting out there, it seems logical that I'd want to step in."
O'Reilly sees a comparison between what the new imprint is doing now and the way the independent music scene works. "When you look at bands, there's a variety of ways in which they can put out their work," he says. "I think writers should have the chance to publish in the same way - the choice shouldn't be between remaining unpublished and running after the big multi-nationals."
O'Reilly's previous works were published by Faber and Faber, but for Watermark, he wanted to try a different approach. "The book's still with my agent," he says, adding that it may well be released in the UK by his usual publisher. He has always preferred to do one book at a time rather than tying himself down with multiple-book deals.
"But in the meantime I was really interested in doing a limited run here in Ireland and getting involved with every aspect of the making of the book in a really fundamental way," he says. "This is a good strong Irish edition of the book."
While the book will be widely available in paperback, The Stinging Fly Press is also producing 100 hardback copies and O'Reilly feels positive about Meade's approach to publishing: "It's about making more space for writers to publish their work, particularly more experimental work."
The Stinging Fly magazine has been in a hiatus since Meade decided to take a break last year. "I'd been working on it for six years and it was time for me to stop and think whether this was what I wanted to do," he says. "When you're working on it, you don't have time to look around and plan things - you get caught up in just getting the next issue out."
After much deliberation, Meade decided that he wanted the magazine to continue and expand. "I decided to come back with a bit more ooomph - turn up the volume up a bit!"
Issue 1 of Volume Two has poetry by Toby Litt, Marge Piercy, Colette Bryce and Caitríona O'Reilly, among others, plus fiction, essays and reviews. The book's launch (and the magazine's relaunch) will take place on Monday, an event that will feature a performance of the text by O'Reilly with Derry actor Pauline Hutton. This blending of media fits in with O'Reilly's desire to combine different artistic forms.
"We're trying to evoke some of the spirit and atmosphere of the book rather than doing a traditional reading," he says. "I also want to play with the idea of fictionalising the author. The person who sits down to write uses a series of masks to reveal themselves, and [can be] a character in themselves. Who is this narrator? It's not me."
Launching a new imprint is a daunting task. The fact that the press's first book is by an acclaimed author means it couldn't have a better start.
www.stingingfly.org