Rupi Kaur Reflects on Being Told Not to Self-Publish 'Milk and Honey'—But Feeling Empowered to Do It Anyway

Rupi Kaur's poetry collection milk and honey became a literary phenomenon when it was published a decade ago, holding a spot on the New York Times Best Seller list for 165 weeks. But it was an uphill battle getting it published in the first place.

The author appeared on Marie Claire's podcast "Nice Talk" and opened up about having to take a leap of faith and self-publish the book. Kaur explains on the podcast that, when she was still in college and first considering publishing milk and honey, she asked one of her creative writing professors for advice. But her professor "just stopped me midway through mid-thought."

She continues, "She [was] like, 'Yeah, I'm sorry to tell you, but nobody publishes poetry, and also most poetry that gets published is by dead people."

Kaur says that she began to consider self-publishing her work, but was similarly met with discouragement from her professor. "She was like, 'Listen, the moment you self-publish, like nobody—the industry is not going to respect you," Kaur reflects. "I was like, 'Well, I'm a brown girl from Brampton. I'm invisible to the industry anyway. So, yeah, do not self-publish is the best advice I've never taken."

The book quickly developed a cult readership once it was published, thanks to Kaur's following on Tumblr and Instagram. Within a year, it was re-released by Andrews McMeel Publishing. And now, on the 10 year anniversary, Kaur is releasing a special anniversary collector's edition.

Since her entrée into the poetry scene, Kaur says she feels like "there has been change" in the publishing industry when it comes to poetry, especially in terms of more women and writers of color being better represented. "They've been forced to see us," she says. "And forced to see that audiences and readers are hungry for work like ours."

Kaur also recalls on "Nice Talk" how she began to struggle creatively amid her whirlwind success, explaining that she felt "riddled with anxiety" while working on her second book, 2017's the sun and her flowers.

"I fully and wholly believed that I'd lost my touch and I'd lost whatever magic there was," she remembers. "That's what anxiety does, right? It lies to you and it has your voice and it's coming from your mind. So you're like, 'Well, that must be the truth.'"

Kaur says she had convinced herself she would "never" be able to experience the same creative flow that she did while writing milk and honey as a teenager and in her early 20s, but "persevered anyway" because of her passion for the craft. She later also released 2020's home body.

"The silver lining is the flow state has come back and it's really exciting," she adds. "I'm holding on to it, but not too tightly. I'm sort of just like, 'Thank you for arriving and I'll take you while you're here. And then you might decide to leave and that's okay.'"

Kaur opens up more about her experience as a published poet, from having to address the people she writes about to navigating financial anxiety in her career, on this week's "Nice Talk." The episode is out now wherever you listen to podcasts.