Omnidawn Publishing

About

Omnidawn Publishing is a small, privately-owned, nonprofit publisher based in Richmond, California. It was founded in 2001 by Kenneth Keegan and Rusty Morrison. They publish primarily explorative poetry books and have won a number of awards over the years.

History

Omnidawn had a rough time financially during the coronavirus pandemic, as many businesses (and people) did. They received a $10,000 grant from the Academy of American Poets’ Literary Arts Emergency Fund in 2022 to help keep them afloat. 312 other nonprofit literary arts and publishing organizations also received funding; a total of $4.3 million was distributed.

In 2022, Kenneth Keegan passed away from cancer. Before he died, he and Rusty Morrison appointed Laura Joakimson to take his place as co-publisher and executive director. She and Morrison are the current co-publishers of Omnidawn.

Mission

When Omnidawn was founded in 2001, their mission statement was, “Lively, culturally pertinent, emotionally and intellectually engaging literature can be of great value, and it is a privilege to participate in the work.” Since then, the mission statement has changed to be more focused on diversity in the authors they publish. Their most recent mission statement is that Omnidawn “seeks to support and expand our community of writers and readers through the work we choose to publish, which questions, in both form and content, the prevailing limits of convention.” They especially focus on publishing underrepresented people; they publish minority, disabled, queer, and otherwise disadvantaged authors.