Chronicles of a Small Press in Boerum Hill

Bob Hershon has been the editor of Boerum Hill's own small publishing house, Hanging Loose Press, for "only about 1,000 years.”

Sitting in the foliage-rich yard of the Hanging Loose Press office, located on the ground floor of a Boerum Hill brownstone building, he commented on the remarkably pleasant late summer weather, in between listing authors and book titles published by the press over the more than 40 years the publishing house has existed. The Wyckoff Street residence is also home to Hershon and his wife, assistant editor of the press, Donna Brook.

“You can tell I used to be a newspaper man,” he jokes as he pointedly spells out the name of each writer and affiliate he mentions in his tale.

On Tuesday, September 20, Hanging Loose is launching Elizabeth Swados' new collection, “Waiting: Selected Nonfiction” at at 7 p.m. The evening of readings, literary discussion and mingling is free and open to all.

“A few years ago, out of the blue, she sent her poems to the magazine,” recalls Hershon. Taken in by her work, and impressed by her range as an artist, from drama teacher to playwrite, Hershon asked her to read at the Brooklyn Public Library one year.

“We instantly became great pals," he said.

Hanging Loose Press earned its name from the original format of the Hanging Loose literary magazine, first put together in 1966. Composed of loose mimeographed pages stuffed into an envelope, which served as the magazine cover, it was mailed out to libraries and subscribers. The first issues of Hanging Loose were low-budget, and the content was to-the-point.

The magazine is now a glossy 116 page affair, smoothly bound, featuring glossy color prints of featured artists alongside works of poetry.

Hershon readily rattles off a list of Brooklyn authors Hanging Loose has published, including Joan Larkin, Mark Statman, Dennis Nurkse, the former Poet Lauriate of Brooklyn, Harvey Shapiro, New York Times editor for several years, Michael Cirelli and many many others.

“We started out wanting to publish new writers,” Hershon explained. “It's easy to rely on the greats, to create a list of your top favorite classic poems.”

“We still publish a lot of first books, and that is the test of the small press," he continued. "First books are difficult to publish – they are hard to sell, and hard to get reviewed.”

Hanging Loose has stayed with many of its once new writers, now “old” after many years. Established authors include Sherman Alexi, of whom Hanging Loose has published many poetic works.

Hanging Loose's repertoire of works is primarily poetry, with some works of short fiction. True to the nature of a small press, Hershon is a human lexicon of authors, works and relevent literary figures, quick to tell the origin of one author, and the impact on modern poetry of another.

Although it has grown over the years, Hanging Loose has remained true to its roots, putting new works of literature on bookshelves across the country, in an established but relatively small-scale endeavor.

"It's hard to distribute a book, in general. We distribute to lots of libraries, and have many subscribers, God bless them," reflects Hershon.

As for the relatively recent market innovation of e-books, Hershon does not seem overly concerned.

"I'm not a doom-sayer. Technology will continue to advance. Television didn't kill the movies," he said.

"I believe in books. There are certain people - like me - who will always prefer an actual thing, the book itself," he added.

Hershon, who started out as a copyboy for the New York Herald Tribune, before moving to the west coast to follow reporting jobs, has recently retired – from one of his jobs. Since the mid 70s, he has been the executive director for Print Center, an organization that provides printing services for not-for-profits. He retired last year.

But at work and at home, both in the literal and literary sense, Hershon still works seven days a week for Hanging Loose Press.