Woman Life Freedom Anthology

Woman Life Freedom Anthology

Dear Community,

We are creating an anthology of poems inspired by the Iranian protests and feminist revolution of 2022 titled “Woman, Life, Freedom: Poems for the Iranian Revolution.”

Guernica Editions is planning to publish this anthology. They have accepted to open the call to the international community, as the Iranian diaspora lives in many countries. In the spirit of the chant, “Woman, Life, Freedom,” submissions will be open to all poets around the world.

This international focus means that Guernica Editions will lose the opportunity to receive tax credits and other Canadian grants for this title, which they depend on as an independent Canadian publishing house. The lack of grants to offset the costs would make it very difficult to cover the costs associated with publishing this book, from paying the editors and creating the cover art, to offering honorariums to contributors and paying for postage to mail contributor copies.

We are Bänoo Zan, Iranian-born poet and activist, and editor Cy Strom. As the originators and co-editors of this publication, we are giving weeks of our time to produce and edit “Woman, Life, Freedom: Poems for the Iranian Revolution.” Both of us are contract workers, which means that we do not receive a fixed salary and will be giving up the chance to accept paid work while we devote our efforts to this anthology. We believe that all contributors to literary projects like this one deserve compensation in addition to artistic recognition.

We are receiving the funds in a dedicated bank account opened by Cy Strom. Therefore, he is formally the fundraiser’s beneficiary at this stage.

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The purpose of this fundraiser is to allow us to do everything we wouldn’t otherwise be able to: compensate contributors, editors, and artists, and publish a professionally produced volume.

Please contribute if you can and share with your network of people and organizations who wish to help these voices proclaim their support for the women of Iran in living lines of poetry.

In solidarity,

Bänoo Zan and Cy Strom

Poster: Roxana Khoshravesh