Our Publishing Philosophy

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John Milton, in his magisterial defense of freedom of publication, Areopagitica, compared truth to a fountain. He averred that just as a gleaming fountain must be refreshed by turbulent waters, so must a fruitful pursuit of truth be joined by boisterous rivals.

Let the waters cease to stream, however, and you will be left with a fetid pool of “conformity and tradition.”

Book lovers surveying the literary scene, and bearing Milton in mind, might conclude that the publishing industry is in need of a cleansing rush of water. The contemporary book business, uniform in its enthusiasms and impatient of idiosyncrasy, has turned stagnant.

What is to be done?

Milton faced a similar problem in seventeenth century England, and found his answer in ancient Athens, on a hill dedicated to the Greek god of war, Ares. Atop this height - Areopagus - sat a court that judged the city’s most vital matters. Among the court’s responsibilities was the task of censorship. An onerous duty, that, but one the court discharged with a light touch. Milton offered Areopagus as an example to Parliament, which he believed censored too severely.

It was better, he believed, to trust in a people’s native reason than to smite - in their behalf - expressions of thought. Let them sort good from bad. The careless suppression of writing and speech not only stamps out worthy ideas, but also inculcates intellectual feebleness in people: deprived of the opportunity to make judgments, their ability to discern the truth withers.

Present-day book publishers, of course, lack the state’s coercive power. Nevertheless, a multiplicity of them have acted in concert against the non-conforming. We have thus been deprived of views and philosophies that it would benefit us to know. As Milton noted, “that which purifies us is trial, and trial is by what is contrary.”

We at Ares Press believe that one of the most important things a publisher can do is to produce work that is animated by a spirit of contrariness. Our highest wish should be to present a clash of competing notions of the good. Contest enlivens and strengthens us, and it is in the disorder left by colliding ideas that we find the truth. Toward this end, we seek a leap of imagination and a broadening of empathy.

We mean to stir the waters a bit.

Books are the physical incarnation of our thoughts and ideals, and they record how we are faring as reasoning beings. At the moment, too much of our experience is missing from this record. It seems we are consumed with navel-gazing and looking inward. It would be far better to look to the wide world beyond us.