Robert Lawson / Blue Bathtub Books

Robert Lawson
Blue Bathtub Books

I don't recall exactly when I met Robert Lawson electronically because I never met him in person but I met him a handful of years ago when he was just starting his Blue Bathtub experiment of creating a book of poems a month for something like 3 years. (Correct me if I am wrong, Robert). Lawson is a teacher of English in Spain. A Brit. A man of boundless energy and a bit of Brautigan/Bukowski in his soul. The books he created and sent me in the mail monthly were both explosive and more than occasionally written on a typewriter with drunken fingers.

The covers began humbly but over time became more distinctive and dare I say it - professional looking. The poems were mixed but definitely immediate. I completely enjoyed Robert's experiment and results thereof.

Once his project was completed, he went silent. Onto his next endeavor. Whatever that might be. It will be nearly impossible to find any of these chapbooks since he didn't mass produce any of them. What was most important was immediacy and that he accomplished.

hi folks, sorry about that!

It's March and I have only written 3 entries for the year. I am remiss. Sorry. Yesterday at the local library I hold a second chapbook exchange to an empty room and while I should know better, I have left things to autopilot and autopilot doesn't do well (actually, it doesn't do anything at all) SO, I apologize. I will get back on the schtick and do better for the rest of the year. I promise.

So. Yeah, I held a chapbook exchange and exhibition in our local library which was a big mistake - not because chapbooks are non-literary but maybe because the local library patrons are. I have chapbooks from England, India, and now Spain on display but the only ones seeing them are my wife and kids (and they have seen them already, groaningly)

A local library in the boonies only works if a number of publishers live in the area and want to hob-nob. All the publishers I invited live in the city, and don't usually travel to the boonies for such - yawn - affairs. It would be like having a book fair in an area with a population in the dozens and have expectations. I had no expectations. If I had had expectations, I might have heaved the mighty boulder up the mountain with greater glee but as it was, I left things to chance but Chance is the cousin of Autopilot, and you know how that works.

As it is, I have a lump of chapbooks from Yo-Yo Labs to review as well as one which arrived yesterday from Blue Bathtub Books in Spain. Plus others I have been sitting on. I will stand up now and move them off my seat. Till Soon stevenallenmay