Daniel Handler Launches Per Diem Press, With $1,000 Prize For Poetry

Daniel Handler Launches Per Diem Press, With $1,000 Prize For PoetryPhoto: Meredith Heuer/Facebook
Camden Avery
Published on December 19, 2016

Upper Haighter Daniel Handler, better known to many readers as Lemony Snicket, the brain behind the bestselling children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events and All the Wrong Questions, has a new project in the works: Per Diem Press, a new (very) small press dedicated to poetry. 

Handler (who's also written several novels under his own name, including the forthcoming All the Dirty Partsannounced this week on Facebook that Per Diem will publish a single chapbook of poetry in early 2017, "hopefully designed" by his wife, "the noted illustrator Lisa Brown ... just as soon as I make her a martini and ask her." 

Per Diem is named for its funding source: Handler's unused daily stipend for the Vancouver filming of Netflix's new show based on A Series of Unfortunate Events, which is set to debut on January 13th. 

Handler is currently accepting submissions from "poets of every stripe" who can supply "eightish pages" of new material written in English. Work can be forwarded to the care of Per Diem Press at 912 Cole St. #331, San Francisco, CA 94117.

The winner will receive $1,000 and free copies of the resulting chapbook, as well as, hopefully, at least one joint reading with Handler.

Handler added that Per Diem will resume again at "such time as the proprietor receives a substantial amount of money for no good reason."