National Poetry Month

• February 12, 1998

National Poetry Month

Oakland, CA - 1 April 1999 - What do high-tech, Internet communication and poet Sylvia Plath have in common?

Knopf Publishing Group (a division of Random House) launches its first large electronic distribution of poems to readers across the world and celebrates the opening of the Knopf Poetry Center and National Poetry Month.

Knopf uses the Lyris ListHosting service for its email "poem-of-the-day" project that delivers the richness of poetry right into readers' email boxes during the month of April.

Sonny Mehta, President of the Knopf Publishing Group, states, "E-mail distribution gives us a wonderful opportunity to increase awareness of our authors' works and of poetry in general across a broad spectrum of readers."

Knopf maximizes the impact of its email poem distribution by using Lyris.net email hosting service that uses the high performance Lyris ListManager, capable of delivering over 500,000 email messages per hour.

John Buckman, CEO of Lyris Technologies, commented that, "The need for reliable and sophisticated email technology will continue to grow as publishers increase their efforts to reach out to readers by delivering traditionally print-based literature via email." Knopf will continue its use of the Lyris.net service after National Poetry Month to introduce new publications and new poets.

The distribution of electronic poems highlights the importance of National Poetry Month, and increases awareness of the Knopf Poetry Center as a new literary resource those features 33 poets during the month of April. The Poetry Center also provides readers with easy access to poetry critiques, letters, and the nearly 200 volumes of poems, which the imprints of the Knopf Publishing Group currently have in print.

The email poem project not only allows Knopf to reach out to poetry lovers but also encourages literacy by providing people, who may not otherwise read poetry, a chance to experience the depth of works by poets Sylvia Plath, Langston Hughes, Raymond Carver, Rita Dove, Herni Cole, Michael Ondaatje, and 27 other poets.

By using sophisticated email technology such as the Lyris.net email list hosting service, Knopf Publishing Group helps the artistry of a traditionally print-based literary form, spring to life on readers' computer screens and awaken a life-long interest in poetry.

To join the Knopf poetry list, visit: http://www.randomhouse.com/knopf/poetry.

For more info about how other Random House publishers use Lyris to reach out to readers, read about John Grisham's Fans.