Publisher Profile / Milkweed Editions

Milkweed Editions

Facts

Mission and genres: “To identify, nurture and publish transformative literature, and build an engaged community around it.” Specializing in the literary genre, Milkweed is looking to be a “site of metamorphosis” for authors and their works.

Publisher and CEO: Daniel Slager

Year Founded: 1980

An Interview with the Publisher

Publisher Daniel Slager says Milkweed Editions specializes in “books that change the way people see the world,” and with more than three decades under its belt, and award-winning books to showcase, it must be working. FTW wanted to know more. Below the news, read what makes Milkweed Edition’s books stand out and what keeps Slager up at night.

Daniel Slager
Milkweed Editions is a nonprofit, and you recently completed a successful fund-raising campaign. What is the advantage of this business model rather than traditional for-profit? With contributed income supplementing earned income from sales, we are in a position to publish books that may not have the kind of potential for sales that is necessary—or at least assumed—at commercial publishing houses. This additional revenue makes it possible for us to take more chances, to acquire and publish more first books, and to publish the kind of literary books that add considerable value to society, even if they have no chance to become bestsellers.