So, you want to put together a poetry manuscript and send it out for publication. Should you work towards a chapbook or a full-length book? What’s the difference? What are the trade-offs?
The most important distinction is the size. Chapbooks are a lot shorter books of poetry. Usually, the number of pages hovers around 26, although I’ve seen chapbooks with page counts from the low-teens to the upper-thirties, even forties. A full-length poetry book typically is of at least 50 pages.
Who should publish a chapbook? Here are several signals that a chapbook is a more appropriate project than a full-length.
Go ahead and publish a chapbook if:
1. You’ve never published a volume of poetry and now you have an opportunity to do so. Publication can be very rewarding, although the endeavor rarely is entirely positive. In any case, it is a very worthwhile and eye-opening experience. You will learn a lot about the process, and you will learn a lot about yourself. Also, you get to add the words “author of a poetry chapbook” to your bio, and that is no small thing.
2. You have a stand-alone work of 20-40 pages of poetry. Of course, the biggest reason to publish a chapbook is having a chapbook-size manuscript. Because of their smaller size, it’s easier to put together themed, fascinating and cohesive manuscripts and, in my experience, publishers love to see themed chapbooks. This doesn’t mean that you could not or should not put together a theme-free manuscript, especially if it is representative of your best work.
3. You don’t have immediate plans for a full-length book. In the United States it is perfectly acceptable to publish a chapbook of poems, and then use these same poems again (part of them or even all of them) later on in your full-length book. In a way this makes the chapbook a “safe” way to publish, because the work is not lost. You can publish it again. So you can take risks with the chapbook – give a chance to a new publisher, or even publish it yourself.
4. You are “in-between books.” If you recently published a full-length book, and you think it will be years until you will release another, you may consider publishing a chapbook in the meantime. Something like a preview of what you’re working on now and what your fans and friends can look forward to in a future volume.
5. You need a home for the orphans. That sounds worse than it actually is. Often when you finish a manuscript (either full-length or a chapbook) for one reason or another, wonderful poems don’t make it in. Sometimes you have enough of these good poems to make another book. Take a look at what you have. You may be surprised.
But wait! Are there disadvantages to publishing a chapbook? And when should we keep our noses to the page and complete a full-length? I will address these in another installment of In my Own Accent.
I would like to give credit to poet Leatha Kendrick. Some of these thoughts arose in a conversation she and I had before we co-taught the class “How To Put Together a Poetry Chapbook Manuscript” at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning in Lexington, Kentucky.
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