chapbook
Americannoun
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a small book or pamphlet of popular tales, ballads, etc., formerly hawked about by chapmen.
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a small book or pamphlet, often of poetry.
noun
Etymology
Origin of chapbook
Explanation
An inexpensive literary booklet or pamphlet, often bound with hand stitching, is called a chapbook. If you want to share your poetry, you should make some chapbooks and pass them out to your friends. Chapbook was coined in the early 1800s from chap, short for chapman, a peddler who sold wares including chapbooks. Before the mid-19th century, they were wildly popular, especially with people who couldn't afford books. Religious tracts, folk tales, children's stories, almanacs, and many other types of literature were published as chapbooks. Poetry chapbooks, printed on stitched or folded sheets of paper, saw a resurgence in the 20th century that continues today.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Monica Sok is the author of “A Nail the Evening Hangs On” and the chapbook “Year Zero.”
From Washington Post • Apr. 14, 2023
The reissued album went on sale in 2014, accompanied by a chapbook that included an autobiographical interview with Mr. Haggerty, photos of him and transcriptions of his lyrics.
From New York Times • Nov. 10, 2022
His chapbook “Touched” was released in 2018, and he has received multiple awards and fellowships including the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation.
From Seattle Times • Sep. 21, 2022
As a rapper and scholar, I wrote about this scapegoating in a chapbook, "Rap & Storytellingly Invention," published with the peer-reviewed album I released in 2020.
From Salon • Jun. 15, 2022
The same material was used also in a Dutch chapbook, Jan wt den vergiere, of which a copy printed at Amsterdam is preserved at Göttingen.
From The Grateful Dead The History of a Folk Story by Gerould, Gordon Hall
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
