Shrinking Violet Press was founded in January 2014 by Peter Cameron after he was forced to close Wallflower Press, which he had established in 2010. Columbia University Press trademarked the name Wallflower Press in 2011 and ordered Cameron to cease and desist publishing books using that name.
Shrinking Violet Press publishes limited-edition, hand-crafted chapbooks of poetry and prose in first editions of only ten copies. Each book is edited and designed by Cameron and created by him with covers fabricated of vintage papers and textiles, and hand-sewn bindings. He publishes his own work along with the work of writers he admires.
Shrinking Violet Press books are published in a series of five titles, which may be bought individually or at a discount by subscribing to the entire series. Each first edition book is numbered from 1 – 10 (an additional five copies, A – E, are not for sale). When (if) a book sells out its first edition it becomes available as a Shrinking Violet Reprint. These reprint editions are less elaborately produced than Shrinking Violet first editions, in a uniform design and size, but are still hand-crafted with vintage paper boards and hand-sewn bindings. Only 100 numbered copies of Shrinking Violets Reprints will be produced. Wallflower Press titles that had become available as Wallflower Reprints will continue to be available through this website, and will maintain their numbered sequence of 100 copies.
Series II
Solid Ivory: Memoirs by James Ivory
Shrinking Violet Press continue its groundbreaking publication of Solid Ivory: Memoirs by James Ivory, the memoirs of the renowned film director, with its next series of books (Series II). These books, Volumes III – VII, will be published at bi-monthly intervals over 2016-17 and will join the first two volumes in the Solid Ivory series, Eating in the Depression and Blomie: Dramatics, which were published in December of 2014.
The five volumes to be published in 2016 follow Mr. Ivory from his childhood in Klamath Falls, Oregon – including his memory of the first movie he ever saw when he was 3 years old – to his sexual and romantic adventures during his university and army days, out into the wider world, including stops in Afghanistan, Venice, George Cuckor's living room, the about-to-be demolished stage of the old Metropolitan Opera House, and the Great Ball at Wilton. Ivory re-creates all of these people and places by observing them with his gimlet director's eye and then writing about them with sympathy and wit. The volumes are organized as follows:
Volume III: Klamath Falls
Mr. Ivory remembers growing up in Klamath Falls, Oregon.
Volume IV: Love & Sex
Mr. Ivory remembers his early and formative experiences of love and sex.
Volume V: With Letters of Introduction
Mr. Ivory travels to Venice (1950) and Kabul (1960).
Volume VI: Portraits
Mr. Ivory remembers his encounters with George Cuckor, Kenneth Clark, Dorothy Strelsin,Susan Sontag, Licia Albanese, et alia.
Volume VII: The Great Ball at Wilton & A Day in the Country and City
with Lillian Ross and William Shawn
In 1979, Mr. Ivory and Mr. Ismail Merchant attend The Great Ball at Wilton, and are house
guests of Lady (Maria) St. Just at Wilbury Park.In 1966, Mr. Ivory and Mr. Ishmail attend the christening of Lillian Ross' adopted baby Erik, along with J.D. Salinger and William Shawn.
All of these books will be published in a limited first edition of ten copies complete with hand-sewn bindings and boards covered in antique silk. They are availabe for $125 a piece, or you may subscribe and receive all five books for the discounted price of $500.
