In Pittsburgh, a city known for balkanization, what with its countless neighborhoods and various parochial idiosyncrasies, the literary scene functions much like a fractal. It is constituted of a culture that encompasses communities of artists, musicians, publishers and writers within communities of artists, musicians, publishers and writers.
July 18, 2009, the opening day of the first-ever Pittsburgh Small Press Festival expo at Carnegie Mellon University's Miller Gallery did well to acknowledge the multifaceted nature of the Pittsburgh literary scene while highlighting the unity in diversity that provides a nucleus for an ever-widening cultural circle of artists in the Pittsburgh area.