Pariah Press
Est. 2014, Manchester UK.
PARIAH PRESS is an independent contemporary art publisher and research-led design studio. Specialising in innovative literature and photography, we co-create mass-market paperbacks, photobooks, exhibition catalogues, pamphlets, zines and ebooks.
Our published works attempt to engage in critical dialogues with and explore notions of: exile, the underdog, mental wellbeing and censorship.
See the website for an in depth dive and a blog! Order directly from us, there’s lots of discounts. Socials: we’ve scaled back our use of Facebook and Twitter, and exist now mainly on Insta. We urge everyone to shift to Mastodon!
Pariah Press can be found at:
Website: https://pariahpress.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pariah_press
Mastodon: https://mas.to/@pariahpress
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/pariahpress.bsky.social
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pariahpress
Twitter: https://twitter.com/pariahpress
When did you start publishing?
Pariah Press were established in 2014 by Jonny Walsh and Jamie Lee in Night & Day Cafe, Manchester.
What made you want to start an independent publisher?
Jamie’s band, Money, used a practice room in the basement of Night & Day, I was running the ents. side of the venue at the time.
We spent endless hours bemoaning the lack of stimulating literature being published in that moment. And, being full of the piss & vinegar of youth, imagined we could offer something more exciting.
What genres do you specialise in?
We began with ‘outsider literature’ — broad as that is: historically pertinent, challenging yet not inaccessible. There’s a notion that we’re seeking to be edgy or obscure or Cool. Quite the opposite. We’re basically misfits, as are often the authors we work with. We want to be popular, but that needn’t mean compromising on quality at any stage. I prefer a pulpy type of style, brash and anti-tasteful—for want of a better phrase. Jamie’s more refined. Hopefully we land somewhere in-between. Never truly retro, never fully in the now.
Fiction, non-fiction, poetry, novels, short stories. Probably to our detriment we didn’t stay in one place for very long. I realised that, quite unintentionally, all of the initial publications had a strong visual element… The Myth of Brilliant Summers (photographs), A Collection of Nineteenth Century Broadside Ballads… (facsimiles of original newsprint broadside ballads), Obscenity & the Arts (photographs), Passing Time (map). Around the turn of the 2020s I began to explore photobook publishing and the idea of working with visual artists as authors. I enjoy working with archives, which has since taken us in some exciting directions.
Where are you based?
Manchester and London. Though more precisely Prestwich and Bow. Although, that’s about to change due to these tricky, intemperate times in this decrepit country. We did have an office under an art gallery and studios on the Salford/Manchester border, but it was knocked down suddenly, in its place now a glass skyscraper full of empty box flats, who would’ve thought?
Do you have a submission window, if so when?
As a rule we don’t accept submissions, but, predictably, that can be broken — the window and the rule.
What is your submission procedure?
If you would like to chance your arm then email us. But, don’t send the full work and do tell us about its contents: thematic and structural… and also what you’re about too.
Who are you (team photo if possible)?
Jonny mainly and Jamie. Adam Griffiths is excellent to bounce ideas around with and has contributed some amazing designs so far. All the authors and designers we’ve worked with have helped build things. Publishing’s ultimately collaborative.
Who’s Who In PARIAH
What was your background in the book industry before this venture?
I worked in book retail for a few years… Borders (RIP), Chorlton Bookshop (shout out). Jamie’s got a masters degree in poetics, or thereabouts.
Talk about some of your books if possible, upcoming, favourite?
We’ve just published a second tome by former APN and Gay Times photographer Stuart Linden Rhodes, it’s a large-format photobook, glossy and brash: LINDEN ARCHIVES. We’ve been wanting to scale up for a while. Although I think I marginally prefer the smaller, neater first book we did with him: Out & About with Linden. No real reason, just personal preference. Stuart’s great to work with. Melissa Lee-Houghton’s latest, Exposure / Ideal Palace is also similarly oversize. It is physically awkward, which fits with the subject matter and difficulty of the text itself.
Linden Archives
Picking a favourite’s difficult. We’re happy with all the books. Form has followed content with each project, so the trick has been retaining branding and keeping the quality high while offering vastly different products. In terms of whole project experience, Passing Time is a favourite. A lockdown book, a lot of hard yakka re-editing and working well with Cath Annabel, who came on board as a guest editor.
Obscenity & the Arts also was a fulfilling experience. A privilege to be the first publishing house to edit and release work from the International Anthony Burgess Archive. Contacting and receiving emails and testimony from lots of Burgess’s old friends was a wonderful process. Andrew Biswell was instrumental in letting that book happen and he’s someone we always enjoy talking to.
Forthcoming we’ve got a ten year anniversary catalogue almost ready, entitled “A Dog on a Cross: Ten Years of Pariah Press”
We’ve a number of archives and artists we’re looking to work with including Ciarán Wood and Ella Skinner.
