Kaija Straumanis Says Goodbye (Mostly!) to Open Letter

As part of the publishing agreement between the University of Rochester/Open Letter Books and Deep Vellum Publishing, Kaija Straumanis—long-time senior editor for the press—will be departing later this month. (Mostly. More on that below.) Since she’s been here for so long, and has been such an integral part of this phase of Open Letter’s history, I wanted to give her a chance to say a public farewell.

From Kaija:

Dear colleagues and friends,

My last day as Editorial Director for Open Letter Books will be October 13^th, 2025.

My time with the press has been more than a career—it has been the air I breathe, the dreams I dream, my home away from home. I have been grateful since day one to its founder and publisher, Chad W. Post, my various colleagues during my tenure, and the University of Rochester for turning my childhood dream-job into my reality, and a place to continually learn and grow.

These 13 years working at Open Letter, especially with all these talented authors and translators, have helped me become a better reader, better translator, better editor, and—I wholeheartedly believe—better person. Providing access to and a stage for world voices and literature in translation is so important, always, and it has been a pure pleasure and the greatest honor to be part of Open Letter’s mission and committment thereto. And as my path rounds a new bend (and it is a little scary), it puts me at ease to know that Chad will continue, as ever, to run the press under these values, and to forever champion its artists and their work.

Thank you to everyone I’ve worked with over these years via Open Letter, and to the authors and translators for having me be part of bringing your works into publication. I look forward to meeting you again soon, elsewhere or otherwise, and I can’t wait to see what we will all continue to accomplish.

With love,

Kaija

Although Kaija won’t be a full-time employee of Open Letter’s anymore, she will continue to typeset all our books (and doing similar work for other presses), proofread as many as I can coerce her into (her eyes are invaluable), doing some informal consulting (about books under consideration and keeping my tone in line), and, as is mentioned below, translating at least one title for