Persea Books

ABOUT

Persea Books is an independent New York publisher founded in 1975, marking its 50th anniversary in 2025 with the anthology "However and Wherever We Are." The press has built a distinguished poetry list over five decades, publishing figures such as Paul Celan, Osip Mandelstam, Nazim Hikmet, Laura Riding, Les Murray, and Marie Howe, alongside contemporary poets like Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Cameron Awkward-Rich, and Patrick Rosal (currently the Guggenheim Museum's 2026 Poet-in-Residence, with all five of his collections published by Persea). Persea is also known for administering the Lexi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Award, an annual prize that results in publication of a poetry collection by a woman who has not yet had a first book published.

Persea does not run a general open submission queue for poetry; entry points are almost entirely prize-based, chiefly the annual Lexi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Award, which carries its own entry fee, reading period, and eligibility rules (women poets without a previously published full-length collection) rather than being a rolling-submissions press. Poets should expect standard contract terms and royalty/advance arrangements typical of a small independent literary press rather than published pay rates, and no fee or response-time specifics are listed on the main site — check the prize's own guidelines page for current deadlines and entry fees. The website functions primarily as a catalog and bookshop (Squarespace-based, with a cart and direct order links) rather than a submissions portal, so writers should look to the press's specific award pages or direct correspondence for manuscript queries outside the contest.