Willow Springs :: NewPages Guide to Literary Magazines

        

Willow Springs

About Willow Springs: A literary journal affiliated with Eastern Washington University's Inland Northwest Center for Writers. We publish fiction, poetry, literary nonfiction, and interviews.

Publisher’s description: Willow Springs publishes the finest in contemporary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, as well as interviews with some of the most notable authors in contemporary literature, including Marilynne Robinson, Stuart Dybek, Aimee Bender, and Robert Bly. Founded in 1977 and published twice yearly, Willow Springs features two interviews per issue, as well as arresting essays, fiction, and poetry by a diverse variety of writers—from the unknown and up and coming, to U.S. Poet Laureates and Pulitzer Prize winners. An indispensable resource for writers and readers, Willow Springs engages its audience in an ongoing discussion of art, ideas, and what it means to be human.

Recent Issues:

Willow Springs issue 71 features work by Charlie Clark, Ann Pancake, and Alexandra Teague. In an interview, Erin Belieu discusses ego. “I’ve never understood why people are so unnerved by the tininess of our human experience. We’re just biological blips in the wholeness of time. But what a lovely thing to be.” Blake Butler debates the existence of metaphor. “The art I like makes me know that those things exist, even if it’s like believing in God. I believe in the fact that there can be seven of me in a room that I can’t see. Or that anything can happen.”

Willow Springs issue 70 features poetry and prose by Erin Belieu, Roxane Gay, Diana Joseph, Laura Kasischke, Melissa Kwasny and Jess Walter. In an interview, Tim O’ Brien talks about love as a driving force for war and about how the end of a story can make the reader aware of mortality: “With a book, when you’re lying in bed and you see the dwindling pages, there’s a sense of growing sadness—much like getting old. You can feel the end approaching.”

Willow Springs issue 69 features poetry and prose by Austin LaGrone, Diane Lefer, Joseph Millar, Carl Phillips, Paisley Rekdal, and Matthew Vollmer. Our interview with Robert Lopez examines writing in a state of not knowing and the importance of damage to fiction. Matthew Dickman talks about community, empathy, and delving into a darker part of himself as a writer.