I believe print runs by many major presses are less than 1000; I have heard
from  reliable [as far as i am concerned] that 'new' poets from Faber, for
instance, are only likely to get 600 bopoks published - a figure Stride
wouldn't have any problem matching.

And [to paraphrase Patricia Oxley at Acumen, who has raised this point
before] you can often find first Faber [etc] books still on Waterstones
shelves ten years later. Big presses have warehouse space to store stuff;
Stride etc often dump unsold books, and can't cope with big print runs to
do slow selling from. So print run has nothinbg to do with actual sales or
readership, just print runs.

I think you are absolutely right that publication by major presses is about
promotion/hype/press [call it what you will] - small presses dont have the
cash to do this kind of thing. If Stride can afford launches then the book
sells well - but it often costs more in room hire and wine [not to mention
author/publisher's fares] than we make!

Re Conductors of Chaos review by Harry Smart, I know Harry and wrote to
both him and the editor of the Oxford Whatever when his review appeared.
The latter's reply seemed to indicate that he felt Smart was correct, and
that C of C type poetry was merely an indication of the UK's resistance to
and non-understanding-of American LANGUAGE-type poetries. Harry is well
read [and I sent him some Bernstein etc] and intelligent, he simply rejects
much of this type of poetry.

I think, if one can be generous, that we simply have to accept there are
many sorts of poetries and approaches to them. I've said before that I
think schools of poetry - whether based on style, on publisher, on content,
on philosophy, or academia - are in the main a bad thing. Harry will
discuss - quite intelligently - why/how/what he likes; but in the end he
disagrees and will not budge. William Oxley, another person I have dealings
with - is the same: he will read/review anything offered to him, but in the
end rejects much of itŠ I can't see that this is worse/better/different
from other people [myself included] rejecting much 'traditonal' or
'narrative' poetry.

And I continue to reserve the right to enjoy reading many types of poetry
across the board of styles, schools and philosophies.

None of which means I like all poetry or want to read it all. But I wouldnt
dream of censoring what others want to read; tho i might suggest there are
other things to read or others ways to read/write it.

Rupert




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