Haymarket Books (Chicago, IL) is a publisher of nonfiction and poetry dedicated to struggles for social and economic justice. Haymarket Books has been a partner of the A.R.T. Library Program since 2024.

A.R.T. Library Program Questionnaire gathers insights from librarians and publishers within the Program's distribution network to reconsider and reflect on what it means to make art books public today.

• How do you characterize the books that you publish?

We publish radical nonfiction and poetry. Our goal is to publish books that contribute to struggles for social and economic justice. We strive to make our books a vibrant and organic part of social movements and the education and development of community organizers and their work struggling for a better world. On Palestine and Too Much Midnight, two recent titles contributed to A.R.T.’s Poulin Project, exemplify our publications.”

• How would you define the audience for your books?

We hope that our books reach a broad audience of radically-curious folks and people exploring ideas around social and economic justice. Our core audience is activists and organizers.

• Has the way books are distributed changed in the last five years? (If so, how does it affect what or how you publish?)

We have been trying to create books and materials that are ready to be used in discussion groups in community spaces as we have seen an increase in orders from groups like this in the past five years and a demand for more accessible tools for political education. This is one reason why we aim to have our books be mostly paperbacks that are at an accessible price point, we offer bulk order discounts for community groups and often have materials that accompany our books like discussion guides. We also have a robust political education programming component to our work at Haymarket that includes both in-person conversations at our space in Chicago and online events on our YouTube channel.

• When did you start participating in A.R.T.'s Poulin Project?

2024.

• How do you decide what to donate to the program?

We have a list of books that we have available in full carton quantities that we think are a good fit for large donations because of their relevant subject matter. This is a way for us to move titles that we may have overprinted originally in a way that gets great books out to folks in movement spaces for free.

• How does A.R.T.'s Poulin Project complement your distribution strategies?

It is great to have a community partner who is connected to many spaces—it helps us grow our audience and find homes for books that we think make vital contributions to organizing work and political education. Having the A.R.T. Library Program to distribute our books expands our outreach and helps us build bridges to new readers.