Love’s Labors Not Lost: Kaya Press
By Terry Hong
Special to AsianWeek
Sunyoung Lee and Juliana Koo make up the two-person office that is Kaya Press, a tiny, independent Asian/Asian Pacific American-focused, not-for-profit book publisher based in New York City. For Lee, who is the editor, and Koo, who is managing editor, Kaya is about love — love for APA literature, love for bringing words to life, love for working at something in which they believe wholeheartedly. And true love it is, because for the last three-and-a-half years, both have been working endless hours to keep Kaya Press alive — without pay.
“I bring this up not to evoke pity or to solicit funds,” says Lee, although they would never turn away a donation, “but because this state of affairs is in many ways a reflection of — and arguably a direct result of — the position that independent literary publishers occupy in the global economy today. Underfunded and understaffed, they are often, like Kaya, perched precariously on a narrow ledge of financial viability.”
Perched yet determined. Out of sheer will, Kaya plans to bring forth another six titles before the year is over: Beat Takeshi vs. Takeshi Kitano by Casio Abe, an overdue title coming in August; Aztex, a first novel by poet Sesshu Foster; Tomie’s Chair, a poetry collection by Josey Foo, inspired by an installation of the artist Tomie Arai; The Temperature of This Water by a young Korean American spoken word poet Ishle Yi Park; they who do not grieve, a follow-up to where we once belonged by Sia Figiel, the first published woman novelist from Samoa; and Maps of City and Body by Denise Uyehara, the first in a ground breaking series devoted to performance art.
“Kaya fills a void in the publishing world,” says Koo. “Kaya publishes books from an Asian American perspective — meaning not only do we publish books by Asian American writers, we publish books that Asian American readers will find engaging. We are not limited to publishing things that we think will serve a ‘general’ (read: white) audience, by profit margins or by editors whose ideal in an Asian American novel is the classic immigrant tragedy. We don’t find it necessary to market Asian American books with faux Chinese character typefaces and bamboo imagery. Our list provides a context for books that no general house can give.”
Quang Bao, managing director of the Asian American Writers, Workshop, echoes Koo’s thoughts: “Kaya publishes very edgy work, with almost no eye toward commercial prospects. It’s very admirable in these perilous, publishing times.”
Indeed, both Lee and Koo must rely on “day jobs” to pay their bills. Koo is production coordinator and a publication specialist at Fordham University’s Office of Public Affairs, and plans to develop a career in independent consulting for nonprofit arts organizations. Lee, who was doing production work at Billboard magazine, was recently laid off. “But it’s good for now,” she insists, “because I have more time for Kaya again. I’m at the office four to six days a week.”
Neither Koo nor Lee have even the vaguest notion of jumping ship. “I will always continue working for Kaya as long as it exists, which hopefully will be for my lifetime,” Lee insists. And Koo’s already looking forward to Kaya’s 10th anniversary in a couple of years: “I want to celebrate Kaya with a strong base of passionately committed volunteer editors, publicists, designers, administrators, interns, as well as an equally passionate group of donors and friends.”
Founded in 1994 by Soo Kyung Kim, a post-modern Korean writer who published Liberty Bell in 1990, Kaya has gone through numerous permutations. “She was originally interested in spreading Korean literature by publishing translations in a magazine, but eventually expanded the scope of the project to Kaya Press.” That original magazine idea became Muæ, a spirited anthology/journal highlighting the newest in APA writing, which Library Journal named one of “The Best Magazines of 1995.” Unfortunately, the magazine fell victim to the Korean economic collapse in 1997, forcing Kim to withdraw funding. But Kaya Press somehow managed to survive. In spite of difficult challenges, it’s living up to its namesake — the name, Kaya, comes from one of the ancient Korean kingdoms in the south known for its artistic production.
Since it began, Kaya has published 15 titles, including The Unbearable Heart by poet Kimiko Hahn, which won the American Book Award; East Goes West: The Making of an Oriental Yankee, the groundbreaking 1937 classic by the first Korean American novelist Younghill Kang, which was long out of print; Premonitions: The Kaya Anthology of New Asian North American Poetry, the most comprehensive anthology of Asian North American poetry; Rolling the R’s, a poignant coming-of-age, coming-out first novel by R. Zamora Linmark; Oriental Girls Desire Romance, a savvy, scathing journey through ’80s New York by Catherine Liu; and most recently, Waylaid, a raw first novel about growing up in a seedy New Jersey shore motel by Ed Lin (see June 6 AsianWeek for review).
With each of its titles, Kaya fulfills its mission to give voice to those who otherwise might not get an opportunity to be heard. “I think of the work that I do at Kaya as political work,” says Lee, “not in the sense that we are trying to stuff a certain kind of dogma or point of view down people’s throats — (publishing literature is hardly the proper medium for that!) — but in the sense of giving people access to a greater variety of published materials and greater exposure to ideas, writing techniques and perspectives than they would otherwise not have access to.”
It’s also about inspiration — and both Koo and Lee are nothing if not inspiring in their dedication.
Lee adds, “The criteria by which I would judge Kaya’s success is the extent to which it inspires other writers and artists and readers, whether to think or imagine more expansively, or to consider different perspectives, or to go out and create themselves.”
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