I went to the Chapbook Festival last year and it was really cool. Justin Taylor wrote about it in 2009. Lots of goodness. This year it looks to be great too. I know there are some “off-site” events going on. People ought to list them in the comments.

From their announcement:
Wed Mar 2–Sat Mar 5
Third Annual Chapbook Festival

www.chapbookfestival.org

The Festival celebrates the chapbook as a work of art and as a medium for alternative and emerging writers and publishers. Now in its third year, the festival features a two-day bookfair with chapbook publishers from around the country, panels, workshops, a reading of prize-winning Chapbook Fellows, and a roundtable and launch of Series II in Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Documents Initiative.

The Festival is free and open to the public, though some events require advance registration, as indicated below.

Wed Mar 2, 6:30pm
Panel
History of Art: Collaborations—Text/Form
The Center for Book Arts, 28 W 27th St, 3rd fl
Ed Go, Other Rooms Press; Mary Walker Graham, Rope-a-Dope Press; Winnie Huang, artist; MC Hyland, DoubleCross Press
This panel discussion will focus on collaborations between visual artists and writers. The formal relationships between text and image on a book page are the product of a creative working relationship between artist and writer: join us to explore the many ways these kinds of partnerships can play out. This panel is part of an ongoing series at Center for Book Arts on the history of collaboration in book arts.
organized by the Center for Book Arts

Thu Mar 3–Fri Mar 4, Noon–7pm
Book Fair
Elebash Recital Hall Lobby, The Graduate Center, CUNY
365 Fifth Ave at 34th Street

Thu Mar 3, 1pm
Workshop
Nuts and Bolts for Publishers
The Skylight Room (9100), The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Andrew Kenower, Trafficker; Rachel Levitsky, Belladonna*; Emily Pettit, Factory Hollow; Matvei Yankelevich, Ugly Duckling Presse
This panel brings together experienced chapbook publishers to discuss how to create and run a chapbook press.
organized by Poetry Society of America

Thu Mar 3, 5pm
Workshop

Nuts and Bolts for Writers
The Skylight Room (9100), The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Hossannah Asuncion, 2010 PSA Fellowship Chapbook Winner; Mary Walker Graham, Rope-a-Dope; Jen Hyde, Small Anchor; Jean Hartig, Poets & Writers
This panel will focus on the fine little books that can be produced by hand, from the quick-and-dirty to the fancy-and-giftable, with demonstrations by writers who publish themselves and others, as well as a discussion of how chapbooks can be used to promote work and build community.
organized by Poets & Writers

Thu Mar 3, 7pm
Reading
PSA Chapbook Fellowship Reading
The Skylight Room (9100), The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Judges of the Poetry Society of America’s eighth annual Chapbook Fellowship introduce this year’s winners.
Judges: Cornelius Eady, Kimiko Hahn, James Tate, Rosanna Warren
Winners: Adam Day, Camille Rankine, Andrew Seguin, Hossannah Asuncion
organized by Poetry Society of America

Fri Mar 4, 1pm
Workshop
Pushing Boundaries of Form
The Skylight Room (9100), The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Cara Benson, Dusie Kollektiv; Nate Pritts, H_NGM_N Books; Adam Robinson, Publishing Genius; Felice Tebbe, Booklyn; Mary Gannon, Poets & Writers
This panel brings together a group of publishers that are especially innovative in their approach to chapbook publishing to discuss the books they produce, the way they distribute them to readers and everything in between.
organized by Poets & Writers

Fri Mar 4, 5pm
Workshop
Pushing Genre Boundaries of the Chapbook
Room 9207, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Jen Hyde, Small Anchor Press; Pei-Ling Lue, One Story; Jacqueline Waters, The Physiocrats. Moderated by Kimiko Hahn, MFA Program, Queens College, CUNY
Is the chapbook merely a charming medium for poetry? How is this perceived limitation changing and why? What can the chapbook do for fiction, nonfiction, and drama? Are the publications only for experimental texts? What about digital technologies? How are chapbooks expanding the definition of each genre as well as cross-genre expectations? Is the chapbook just a momentary stay against the brutal commercialization of the industry? Is it even charming? Who cares? Panelists will address these questions and speak about individual projects and visions.
organized by the CUNY MFA Affiliation Group

Fri Mar 4, 5:30pm
Conversation and Book Launch
Book People
A Roundtable on Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative
The Skylight Room (9100), The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th street
Even in the digital age, the book occupies enormous cultural space and remains a central metaphor of many civilizations. How have poets in the 20th and 21st centuries honored and expanded this tradition? How are histories newly created from archival materials and what are the differences between personal and institutional archives? What are the roles of preservation and design in the transmission of culture? In this extraordinary gathering, hear the perspectives of poets, scholars, archivists, and book designers as they discuss these and other questions. Participants include Ammiel Alcalay, poet, scholar, and founder of Lost & Found; Steve Clay, archivist, scholar, and publisher, founder of Granary Books; Megan Mangum, book designer and founder of Words that Work; Anne Waldman, poet and co-founder, with Allen Ginsberg, of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University.

Following the roundtable discussion, join us for a presentation and celebration with the editors of Lost & Found, Series 2, with readings, video, and audio presentations of works by Diane di Prima, Robert Duncan, David Henderson, Margaret Randall, and Muriel Rukeyser. Special guest Ken Irby, author of The Intent On (winner of the 2010 Shelley Award), will launch the series with the reading of a new poem that will be available as a broadside. Sets of Lost & Found, Series 2, will be available for purchase.

Sat Mar 5, 10am–1pm
Workshop
Hands-on Book Arts Workshops for Writers
The Center for Book Arts, 28 W 27th St, 3rd fl
Join us for a hands-on immersion in bookmaking. Participants can choose to set their words in metal type, or try their hand at some basic binding structures.
Registration required: (212) 481-0295
$20 material fee
organized by the Center for Book Arts

Sat Mar 5, 2pm
Reading
What the Chapbook Means to Me
Poets House, 10 River Terrace
Jen Bervin, Ugly Duckling Presse; Anna Moschovakis, poet
Visual artist and poet Jen Bervin and Ugly Duckling Presse editor and poet Anna Moschovakis discuss the way the chapbook has shaped their work, sharing highlights from their own collections and the Poets House archive.
organized by Poets House
Participating publishers:

2nd Ave Poetry
Belladonna*
Booklyn
Creature Press
Cy Gist Press
DoubleCross Press
Dusie Kollektiv
Factory Hollow Press
Forklift, Ohio
Greying Ghost Press
H_NGM_N
Immaculate Disciples Press
Love Among the Ruins
Magic Helicopter Press
Minutes Books
One Story
Pen Press
Pilot Books
Poinciana Paper Press
Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs
Publishing Genius
Rope-a-Dope Press
Slapering Hol Press
Small Anchor Press
Sona Books
Supermachine
The Corresponding Society
The Physiocrats
Toadlily Press
Trafficker Press
Ugly Duckling Presse
X-ing Press/Agriculture Reader

Visit the Festival on Facebook and see who’s coming!

The Graduate Center, CUNY
365 Fifth Ave btwn 34th & 35th. The building and
the venues are fully accessible. For more information
please call 212/817.2005 or e-mail ch@gc.cuny.edu.
www.centerforthehumanitiesgc.org