Commissions

Abstract

Abstract Commissions have a poor reputation in contemporary critical discourse. Too strong is the associative link with the grand seigneurs of times past, who relied on poets to praise their conquests. But precisely because they have such a proven track record of controlling historical and political narratives, commissions are an undeniably strong example of ‘worlding’ through authorship. And by no means can this force be deployed only for negative ends. In this chapter, Ra Page, the founder and editor-in-chief of the Manchester-based publishing house Comma Press, demonstrates how such a process might work. The author offers case studies of short-story anthologies that unapologetically try to alter our perception of the world. They do so not just through their subject matter, but also by how they conceptualize the process of authorship and of the ideological commitments that it entails.