“I cannot remember a time when I was not in love with them—with the books themselves, cover and binding and the paper they were printed on, with their smell and their weight and with their possession in my arms, captured and carried off to myself.”
— Eudora Welty
Soybean Press Home
Chord. (October 2008)
By William S. Merwin
To celebrate the visit of W.S. Merwin to the University of Illinois and the Rare Book & Manuscript Library on 27-28 October 2008, this broadside of Merwin's poem Chord was printed in 100 copies. Set in Palatino Linotype, thirty-three copies were printed on paper made by Steve Kostell and Charles Wisseman from Miscanthus grass fibers grown on campus. Sixty-seven copies were printed on Arches paper.
Thirty-three of the Miscanthus paper copies and seventeen of the Arches paper copies were signed by Merwin.
Signed copies are available for $35, while unsigned may be purchased for $15
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Multiple Merwins: Poet, Translator, Environmental Activist (October 2008)
By Christopher D. Cook, Chatham Ewing, and Dennis J. Sears
This exhibition catalog contains three essays written to accompany an exhibition celebrating different aspects of William S. Merwin's career. Drawn from the Merwin Archive in The Rare Book & Manuscript Library, the exhibition featured manuscript and printed materials illustrating the remarkable and multivariate career of one of America's finest writers.
The essays, by Rare Book & Manuscript Library personnel Christopher D. Cook, Chatham Ewing, and Dennis Sears, each cover a thematic aspect of Merwin's work and include illustrations from the manuscript material in the Merwin Archive at Illinois. The 40 page booklet also contains Merwin's poem Chord, and a foreword by Rare Book & Manuscript Library Head, Valerie Hotchkiss.
The booklet is available for $10 via the address above.
4. The Baby's Foot Becomes a Doorknob. (February 2008)
By Audrey Niffenegger
This whimsical creation of noted book artist and novelist Audrey Niffenegger was hand-printed by the author herself in a very limited press run of 75 signed copies. It is now available to Soybean Press subscribers at the "Journeyman" and "Master Printer" subscription levels. Non-subscribers may purchase it for $50 (postage paid).
The halftone and text are mounted in a green portfolio that includes a colophon
and a slot and groove clasp accented with a laser-cut outline of 
a baby's foot.
1. Milton on Shakespeare. (May 2007)
The very first publication of the Soybean Press, this broadside reprints the poet John Milton's first published work, a tribute to Shakespeare from the Second Folio, in a run of 250 copies on 160 gsm Fabriano Ingres paper. Drawn from The Rare Book & Manuscript Library's collection, this handsome piece celebrates the founding of both the Soybean Press and the new Midwest Book & Manuscript Studies Program at the University of Illinois.
$10 postage paid
3. What the Tau-Fu is Made of: Benjamin Franklin on Soybeans : together with a brief account of the journey of Glycine max from China to Illinois and a note on the Soybean Press. (September 2007)
by Christopher D. Cook
This ten–page booklet revisits the lore surrounding Benjamin Franklin's role in the importation of the soybean into America, affectionately punctures the myth, and serves up a brief and tasteful recounting of the true history of "Chinese Garavances" in this country. Cook also appends the tale of the bean's journey to Illinois, where it has since come to flourish as the State's second most valuable agricultural commodity.
Limited to 100 signed and numbered copies, the booklet is available in both gray and green paper wrappers.
$15 postage paid
Soybean Press publications are provided to subscribers at the "Journeyman" or "Master Printer" levels. Or they may be purchased separately. Please make checks out to:
The Soybean Press
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
and mail* to:
The Rare Book & Manuscript Library
University of Illinois Library, Room 346
1408 West Gregory Drive
Urbana, Illinois 61801
*campus mail code: 522
The Rare Book & Manuscript Library
The University of Illinois Library