Tracy Koretsky

ON GIVING IT AWAY: A REPORT

Every artist should have a gift of their art to give away to the world. So, in August 2009, I released my memoir in poems, Even Before My Own Name.

Let me make this clear: I did not just self-publish – I am giving the collection away. I’ve posted a free e-book version at www.TracyKoretsky.com, and offer the perfect-bound paperback for $5, my cost for printing and mailing.

Sure, I gave up the rite of adjudication, the incomparable thrill of an editor or guest judge selecting, from amongst its peers, my glowing manuscript. This is what one sacrifices when deciding to self-publish. It’s the true crux of the choice; which is more important: getting expert recognition though it might take years, or getting the work out when and how you choose, but without imprimatur?

There is no right answer; I can only speak for myself. In my collection, more than two-thirds of the poems were previously published. They’d received eighteen awards. At one point I fretted that some of the older pieces seemed out of date, so I submitted to anthologies. Their acceptance was reassurance enough. This book felt pre-adjudicated!

I should also say that, artistically, I had moved on. I truly felt I had written everything I wanted to about the subjects and themes of the collection. Besides, the collection was dedicated to "the girl I once was. " That girl didn’t care a whole lot about judges and rules.

Plus, I’d heard this story too many times: after frustrating years of contest fees and waiting, an author finally gets that call. Oops – drop everything. The work you’ve loved and slaved over will be published, and within the foreseeable future. It’s time to get your promotion together (because, no matter how accommodating the publisher, for poetry, this work always falls to the author.) Too bad if you’ve just moved, or had surgery, or lost someone near and dear.

I asked myself, what if I get to decide when’s a good time. And what if I feel that time should be sooner than later?

What if, after I feel I satisfied with the book’s content and design and have firmly grounded my publicity, I launch my book with greater energy and care than any publisher would? What if I continue to do so at my own pace for as long as I want to? After all, if I promoted my book even half-heartedly for one year, it would be forty-eight weeks more than the best publisher would. And if I distributed a single copy more than 250, I would beat their average print run.

I asked myself, how could I put my work into the world in the way I think will have the most impact? How could I make doing so a gratifying experience rather than a hectic frenzy?

Make it game, I thought. Remove money from the equation. Remove prestige. Go for readers – lots and lots of readers. And more than that, for interaction with these readers, because, well, what could possibly be more fun than that? Reviews, too, I thought, because I had to admit, I longed for them. To me they represent the most engaged and serious considerations – even more than that of a contest judge.

I’ll admit I was daunted. There is an infinite amount of work one can do on behalf of one’s book. My mission, I reminded myself, was to feel joy about sharing my work with the world. With that in mind, I allowed myself to lob from my to-do list anything that might drain me of the desire to keep going. Equally, I felt it was my responsibility to seek that joy, to say "yes" to every opportunity, and even, or maybe especially, to learn to see opportunities everywhere.

An example: let’s say a journal asks for a review copy while, in the same sentence, warning that they probably won’t review it. My initial response, perhaps understandably, was: "What a waste of money." But rethinking, it occurred to me that, reviewed or not, my book was on its way to someone who is passionate enough about poetry to be publishing it. Yay! Why not enjoy that I was putting the book out to more reviewers than a publisher would have done for me?

More than anything, I used emails. For many years, every time my work was published, I scoured the authors’ bios for addresses and websites. Every time I attended any kind of writers’ function, took a class, or joined a forum, I captured and saved the email list. I had been an editor on an e-zine; I had that list too. Always, I took care to make note of the list’s origin so I could personalize my mail when the time came. I really wasn’t sure what "time" I was expecting to come, but my instincts told me to carry on anyway, and – to my amazement – when I gathered my files, I found that I had collected thousands of addresses.

To insure that my mails were received, I typed "spam filter words" into my browser for a list of words and practices to avoid, such as multiple fonts or embedded images. There’s a mass-mailing program called Turbo Mailer which, for ten bucks, will send to each address discreetly, another way to avoid spam filters.

My message went through numerous revisions as I refined my approach, though in every version, I invited recipients to forward the mail, to post it on their blogs, or twitter feeds. Apparently quite a few took me up on this.

So how’d I do? At this writing, four hundred and eleven copies have either been downloaded or put in the mail. (Usually a poet would be happy with a hundred sales in one year.) I suppose it surprises no one to learn that a poetry collection is much harder to sell than to give away.

More interestingly though, is where some of these copies went: many places in Africa, India, Singapore, Thailand, even Iceland. – places my work would never have penetrated had I not chosen to publish the way I did. A gentleman in Croatia asked if he could translate them. And since it was my responsibility to say yes, I agreed. So now, every once in awhile, I receive a Google alert in Cyrillic type, which just makes me shake my head in wonder. In truth, I cannot imagine what the memoir of a kid from a dysfunctional family raised in Chicago’s Jewish suburbs could possibly mean to these readers but I do believe that this is one of the true functions of literature: an opportunity towards empathy.

By the way, it is notable that my Croatian translator requested permission. I have found several poems from my collection posted on various blogs with no permission and no attribution beyond my name. I just took these as an opening to respond to the posting with an invitation to download the full collection.

I sent out about fifty review copies. Unfortunately, only later was I told that, if an envelope does not sport a publisher’s logo, many journals toss it out unopened. That’s something I could have fixed and now regret. Nevertheless, the result is seven reviews, with another expected to appear soon. These range from a few lines in one case to multiple pages in another. One came in the form of a poem by a poet who responds to collections ekphrastically.

Actually, I think the number of reviews, Amazon comments, etc. that I have is pretty okay for a first collection. I wish there had been greater response; I suspect that makes me like every other poet who has ever put out a book.

The way I published also got a little coverage. I had one really about it quite enjoyable little interview (amongst other things). In addition I was asked to write as essay for the big paper Poet’s Market annual. Both of these make me sigh for different reasons. Never mind, but every time I think about either one of them, I sigh.

Do I like my collection? I don’t know. Not as much as the next one! (Ah poets, we are fickle.) It’s been embarrassing at moments to share such revealing poems – wonderful too, often touching. Putting work into the world is a powerful thing; giving it away, a liberation. And I’m not done. There are still angles I plan to try, ideas to follow-up on, readers to reach. This way of publishing is very forgiving; it does not expire. You may find it interesting to note, though, that I’m submitting my next collection – a chapbook – to publishers and competitions. It’s just another kind of experience, one I haven’t had. If the adventure is half as interesting as this one has been, it will be well worth it.

Tracy Koretsky gives away her memoir in poems at www.TracyKoretsky.com where you will find audio poems, reviews, author interviews, and links to more work. Read her Wordgathering interview about Ropeless, her 15-time award-winning novel, here. Tracy writes a monthly poetry critique based on work from contributors at WinningWriters