The Oliver Arts & Open Press came into existence in 2009 because, in the view of its founders, publishing in the U.S. had lost its conscience, courage, intellect, and perhaps its mind. The publishing “industry,” as it’s called, is unlikely to have lost these invaluable attributes all at once, or in the order that we’ve listed them here. But the fact is indisputable that, in one way or another, those four virtues have in fact gone missing. And their disappearance—not only in publishing but in the great majority of American institutions—has resulted in enormous cultural, political, social, intellectual, and aesthetic degradation and loss.
Oliver’s aim, consequently, is to work against that erosive tide by publishing the best and most meaningful work it can find—this being, in most cases, work that has been rejected or that continues being ignored by “mainstream” publishing.
Given this reason for its existence, Oliver, unlike other publishers and presses, will refuse to be limited by fossilized or prefabricated notions of “accessibility,” “familiarity,” “propriety,” “respectability,” or “correctness” in genre, subject, attitude, execution, or agenda. In good part, this is why the word “open” appears in the name “The Oliver Arts and Open Press.” Oliver’s search will be for work only of the highest excellence, merit, interest, truth, and authenticity.
