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Florida Review 2013 Editors’ Awards

florida-review-v38-n1-2-2014The current issue of Florida Review features the winners of the 2013 Editors’ Awards, which were awarded in essay, fiction, and poetry categories. As a new feature to this section, the editors invited the winners to contribute about “the creative genesis and evolution of their winning work.” Editor Jocelyn Bartkevicius writes, “Dan Reiter, whose story of Holocaust survivors, ‘All Your First Born,’ won the fiction award, tells of viewing a videotaped interview with his grandparents, who, unlike other family members of their generation did survive the Holocaust, and how their testimony inspired his writing. Lisa Lanser-Rose, whose braided essay, ‘Turnpike Psycho,’ revolves around a friend’s murder and her own harrowing encounter with a stalker, writes about transitioning from a simple retelling of a particular situation to an exploration of its deeper ramifications as a ‘story.’ John Blair, winner of the poetry award, writes of the links between his poems and history, autobiography, and memory, an eclectic continuum with such varied topics as atrocities in Somalia and Chechnya, the Roman Inquisition, leukemia, and hands-on labor in the garden.

Essay Winner

Lisa Lanser-Rose: “Turnpike Psycho”

Essay Finalist

Tanya Bomsta: “Traditions”

Fiction Winner

Dan Reiter: “All Your Firstborn”

Fiction Finalist

Rachel Borup: “Crash”

Poetry Winner

John Blair: “The Lesser Poet,” “And Yet It Moves,” & “Dirt”

Poetry Finalist

Tanya Grae: “Like Darwin’s Finches,” “Verbal Abuse,” & “Cage Sonnet”

American Life in Poetry :: Grant Wood

American Life in Poetry: Column 496
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

One of Grant Wood’s earliest paintings is of a pair of old shoes, and it hangs in the art museum in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where Wood grew up. Here’s a different kind of still life, in words, from Jim Daniels, who lives in Pittsburgh. The shoes we put on our feet gradually become like the person wearing them.

Work Boots: Still Life

Next to the screen door
work boots dry in the sun.
Salt lines map the leather
and laces droop
like the arms of a new-hire
waiting to punch out.
The shoe hangs open like the sigh
of someone too tired to speak
a mouth that can almost breathe.
A tear in the leather reveals
a shiny steel toe
a glimpse of the promise of safety
the promise of steel and the years to come.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem reprinted from Show and Tell, Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 2003, courtesy of the University of Wisconsin Press. Copyright ©2003 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System. Jim Daniels’ most recent book of poems is Birth Marks, BOA Editions, Ltd., 2013. Introduction copyright © 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

Creative NonFiction Craft Essays

The fall issue of Brevity: A Concise Journal of Literary Nonfiction features three new craft essays: “Consider the Prompt” by Dinah Lenney; “When Writing Will Not Make You Free: Resistance Training for Writers” by Judith Pulman; and “On Riding and Writing Boldy” by Monica McFawn. Whle Brevity’s nonfiction submissions are capped at 750 “brief” words, these craft essays go well beyond, allowing writers to freely share their advice and give us readers a great deal from which to glean.

Zymbol Fundraiser Offers Limited Edition Print

Zymbol magazine was started in 2012 as a publication which joined art and literature inspired by symbolism and surrealism. In the short time they have been publishing, they’ve shared the work of artists and writers from over 20 countries, some of whom have gone on to publish award-winning books, opened solo shows, and speak at various conferences and festivals.

Now Zymbol is fundraising to support printing their publication, including some full-color issues, distributing copies to students and contributors. releasing eBook versions and free content on their website, and hosting free literary events a various festivals.

If they exceed their fundraising goals, Zymbol will co-sponsor awards for young artists & writers to further their craft through education, artist residencies, and exhibitions/publications.

kimonoLike a lot of fundraisers, you get cool stuff for various levels of support, including this limited edition fine art poster print, “Kimono,” by Susanne Iles – at just the $25 level. In addition to supporting a great literary/art organization, this seems a great bonus!

New Book from Jesse Glass

jesse glassBased on a widely celebrated case of senteenth century lycanthropy and embodying the Sadean idea of literature as a crime unlimited by time, space, and circumstance, The Life and Death of Peter Stubbe was From Knives Forks and Spoons Press comes Selections from The Life & Death of Peter Stubbe by Jesse Glass. From the publisher: “Based on a widely celebrated case of seventeenth century lycanthropy and embodying the Sadean idea of literature as a crime unlimed by time, space and circumstance, The Life and Death of Peter Stubbe was originally composed from 1980 to 1985 and published in a fine-press, limited edition by Birch Brook Press in 1995. . . In 2012, Glass returned to the manuscript, excerpted from it, and illuminated the redacted text using gouache, pencil, pen and ink, and the result. . . is a further added dimension to the original exploration of metaphysical violence, social chaos, night, and the autonomous nature of language.”

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

meridian

Geogrpahic Tongues is a photo series by Elisabeth Hogeman featured both on the cover and the inside of Issue 33 of Merdian. And yes, it’s really tongues. And yes, they really are quite lovely.

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slipstream 34

Aptly entitled “Rust,” this image by nyk fury sets the theme for issue 34 of Slipstream: Rust, Dust, Lust.

 
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room

Room‘s cover art by mixed media artist Sandra Chevrier is a beautiful expression of this issue’s theme “Geek Girls” (37.3). The piece is “La Cage aux fenêtres laissant entrées un soleil déja mort” (2013).

American Life in Poetry :: Karina Borowicz

American Life in Poetry: Column 495
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

We’re at the end of the gardening season here on the Great Plains, and the garden described in this poem by Karina Borowicz, who lives in Massachusetts, is familiar to tomato fanciers all across the country.

September Tomatoes

The whiskey stink of rot has settled
in the garden, and a burst of fruit flies rises
when I touch the dying tomato plants.
Still, the claws of tiny yellow blossoms
flail in the air as I pull the vines up by the roots
and toss them in the compost.
It feels cruel. Something in me isn’t ready
to let go of summer so easily. To destroy
what I’ve carefully cultivated all these months.
Those pale flowers might still have time to fruit.
My great-grandmother sang with the girls of her village
as they pulled the flax. Songs so old
and so tied to the season that the very sound
seemed to turn the weather.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright © 2013 by Karina Borowicz, whose most recent book of poems is Proof, (Codhill Press, 2014). Poem first appeared in the journal ECOTONE and is reprinted by permission of Karina Borowicz and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

Gimmer Train Very Short Fiction Winners

Glimmer Train has just chosen the winning stories for their Very Short Fiction Award. This competition is held quarterly and is open to all writers for stories with a word count under 3000. The next Very Short Fiction competition will take place in October. Glimmer Train’s monthly submission calendar may be viewed here.

Luchette cred Kate Van BrocklinFirst place: Claire Luchette, of Brooklyn, NY, wins $1500 for “Full.” Her story will be published in Issue 95 of Glimmer Train Stories. [Pictured; Photo by Kate Van Brocklin]

Second place: Omid Fallahazad, of Framingham, MA, wins $500 for “Arrested.” His story will also be published in an upcoming issue, increasing his prize to $700.

Third place: Louise Blecher Rose, of New York, NY, wins $300 for “Deux Ex Machina.”

A PDF of the Top 25 winners can be found here.

Deadline coming up! Family Matters: September 30 Glimmer Train hosts this competition twice a year, and first place has been increased to $1500 plus publication in the journal. It’s open to all writers for stories about families of all configurations. Most submissions to this category run 1200-5000 words, but can go up to 12,000. Click here for complete guidelines.

Idaho Review Awards & Recognitions

idaho-review-v14-2014Awards and recognitions abound for the Idaho Review: Nicole Cullen’s short story, “Long Tom Lookout,” which appeared in our 2013 issue, has been selected for reprint in The Best American Short Stories 2014, edited by Jennifer Egan. “How She Remembers It” by Rick Bass, also from the 2013 issue, will be appearing in The Pushcart Prize 2015.

The newest issue features the Idaho Review 2014 Editor’s Prize, “Tough Love” by Janet Peery.

Structo Atwood Interview & More

Structo12coverPlainThe most recent issue of Structo features an interview with Margaret Atwood that took place in London after she gave the annual Sebald Lecture at the British Library. Interviewer Euan Monaghan follows up on the talk, entitled “Atwood in Translationland,” in which Atwood spoke on the “many kinds of translations” she has lived through in her life as well as her work creating a challenge for translators. Atwood and Monaghan also discuss play writing, the use of genre labels on Atwood’s writing (touching on LeGuin, Bruce Sterling, and slipstream), and of course, the process of writing. Twenty pages in all, this interview is no light fare.

Structo specializes in the true, conversation interview, and three months after publication, makes the interviews available on their web site. There now you can find interviews with Richard Adams, Iain Banks, David Constantine, Lindsey Davis, Stella Duffy, Steven Hall, Inez Lynn & Aimée Heuzenroeder, Ian R. MacLeod, Chris Meade, Kim Stanley Robinson, Sarah Thomas, Katie Waldegrave, and Evie Wyld.

Contest Winners :: Arc Poem of the Year & Diana Brebner Prize

arc-poetry741Arc Poetry Magazine #74 features the winners of the Poem of the Year Contest. Selected from over 500 submissions, one winner receives $5000 – a daunting process even the editors recognize the “craziness” of, beginning with: How were we going to agree on what was the best poem when we sometime can’t even agree on what a poem is? How can anyone just have one “best” poem when so much of what poetry does is question the very ideas of aesthetic hierarchies and commonly agreed upon truths?

Alas, the editors were able to sort, select and agree upon “Consider the Lilies” by Kristina Bresnen. Judges, editors, and e-poetry readers also helped select other poets worthy of “high accolades”: Nancy Holmes, Matt Jones, Michael Lithgow, Steve McOrmond, and Jennifer Zilm.

Additionally, this issue features winning poems of the annual Diana Brebner Prize, open to poets in the Ottawa area who have not yet published a book. Judge Pearl Pirie chose Anne Marie Todkill as the winner and Vivan Vavassis as the runner-up.

The Black Dog of Depression & Alzheimer’s

Another commntary of interest from Psychology Today, this time from reporter and storyteller Greg O’Brien whose memoir ON PLUTO: Inside the Mind of Alzheimer’s is out this September from Codfish Press. O’Brien uses the Black Dog from literature – engaging refrences to Robert Bly, Homer, Apollonius of Tyana, Robert Lewis Stevenson, Winston Churchill – as a means of exploring the “demons of depression.” O’Brien writes about the misunderstandings of what depression means: “It is not a mood swing, a lack of coping skills, character flaws, or simply a sucky day, a month or a year; it’s a horrific, often deadly, disease. . . In depression, there is no off button.”

O’Brien’s book is also the subject of the short film, A Place Called Pluto, directed by award-winning filmmaker Steve James. In 2009, he was diagnosed with Early Onset Alzheimer’s. His maternal grandfather and his mother died of the disease. O’Brien also carries a marker gene for Alzheimer’s.

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

gargoyle-n61-2014

Gargoyle‘s covers are regularly striking, but this issue in particular for its lack of any identifying information about the publication printed over the image, “Urban Graveyard Crows,” © Donna Snyder 2010.

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cimarroncover188

“Disambiguation” is the name of this photo by Nosael Gleason on the Summer 2014 cover of Cimarron Review. Despite the vividly images prickly spindles, I was completely drawn to grab up this issue and run my hand across its cover.

 
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tar online-03

There’s just something hauntingly sweet about this cover image, “Birds” by Jennifer Balkan, on the second issue of The Austin Review.

The Longbox :: Collecting Comic Book Memories

AmazingSpider-Man050Got a box of old comics hanging around somewhere? The Longbox Project would like you to pour back over them, not to see what they may be worth for sale, but to have you share your memories of reading them, of collecting them, of keeping them all this time.

Yes, The Longbox Project is “a memory project for comic geeks.” Inspired by Max Delgado and Kevin Leslie’s own reminiscing through boxes of old comics, The Longbox Project started online in March 2013 with the mission: “To create the most comprehensive anthology of collector-focused memoirs anywhere on the web.”

The prompt is a simple one: “Why is this comic book important to you?”

The Longbox Project publishes interviews, personal stories of comic book writers and artists, and personal stories from any collector looking to share what made that book special, memorable, worth keeping in the box.

A Tribute to Alistair MacLeod

antigonish-reviewThe Antigonish Review Summer 2014 issue features a memorial section to Alistair MacLeod, including a tribute by Associate Editor Sheldon Currie, “Alistair Macleod – Memories in a Window” by Randall Maggs, “The Splendid Man from Dunvegan” by Reynold Stone, and three poems by MacLeod from previous issue of The Antigonish Review.

Westchester Review Writers Under 30 Contest Winners

The newest issue (volume 7) of The Westchester Review: A Literary Journal of Writers from the Hudson to the Sound, includes the winners of the 2nd Annual Writers Under 30 Contest, which is open to writers of poetry and fiction who live, work, or study in the Lower Hudson Valley and who are under the age of 30. The prize for fiction was awarded to Matt Nestor for his short story, “Bushwick,” and the prize for poetry was awarded to Kay Cosgrove for her poem, “Study in Blue.” Both winners received $100, publication, and two copies of The Westchester Review. Runners-up will be considered for publication.

Call for Contributions :: The Virtual Education Project

From The Virtual Education Project: One of the most effective ways of learning is to immerse ourselves in the cultures we study; yet, we often encounter problems when these cultures are separated from us by constraints such as geography or time. When studying various people, places, events, and works, students and teachers rarely have the resources to visit each (if any) historical landmarks pertaining to their subject matter, restricting both research and teaching to textbooks and/or an amalgam of materials from various resources. The Virtual Education Project (VEP) is a large-scale pedagogical undertaking directed at providing both students and teachers with visual introductions to historical and contemporary landmarks (worldwide) relevant to the study of the humanities. Thus, the purpose of the VEP is twofold: 1) to provide educators with a central resource that facilitates both teaching and research, and 2) to encourage independent inquiry amongst students, regardless of their locale.

The Virtual Education Project is currently seeking submissions for photo (or video—email for details) tours of domestic and international sites relevant to the study of the humanities. We are interested in tour submissions that explore local museums, author/artist homes, memorials, public artworks, and any significant cultural or community sites that will aid in the study and/or teaching of the humanities.

We welcome proposals for virtual tours related to the study of the arts, humanities, and sciences, including literature, theatre and/or performance, history, philosophy, rhetoric, and the STEM fields (e.g., the Nikola Tesla Museums in Brograd, Serbia, and Shoreham, NY). The list of examples for this initial Call for Contributions is a starting point, and we encourage you to submit a proposal for a site near you.

Potential tours topics might include (but are in no way limited to):
The Old Manse (Concord, MA)
Emily Dickinson House & Museum: The Homestead & The Evergreens (Amherst, MA)
W.E.B. Du Bois’s National Historic Site (Great Barrington, MA)
Walt Whitman House (Camden, NJ)
William Carlos Williams House (Rutherford, NJ)
Edgar Allan Poe Museum (Richmond, VA)
Thomas Wolfe House (Asheville, NC)
Mark Twain House (Hartford, CT)
Harriet Beecher Stowe House (Hartford, CT)
Ida B. Wells-Barnett House (Chicago, IL)
Jane Addams Hull-House Museum (Chicago, IL)
The House of Happy Walls Museum, Jack London (Glen Ellen, CA)
The Wolf House Ruins, Jack London (Glen Ellen, CA)
John Steinbeck House (Salinas, CA)
Andalusia, Home of Flannery O’Connor (Milledgeville, GA)
Kennesaw Mountain Battlefield (Kennesaw, GA)
Ernest Hemingway Home & Museum (Key West, FL)
Lamb House, Henry James (Rye, East Sussex, England)
Monk’s House, Virginia Woolf (Lewes, East Sussex, England)
Thomas Hardy’s Cottage (Higher Bockhampton, Dorset, England)
Capela dos Capuchos (Sintra, Lisbon, Portugal)
The Houses of Pablo Neruda (Chile)
Vladimir Nabokov House Museum (St. Petersburg, Russia)
Borobudur Temple Compounds (Magelang, Central Java, Indonesia)
Nelson Mandela’s Capture Site (Howick, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa); Prison Site (Robben Island, Wescape, South Africa); and The Mandela House (Orlando, Soweto, South Africa)

Arkansas Review Celebrates Hemingway

Fifteen years ago, the July 1999 issue of Arkansas Review celebrating the opening of the Hemingway-Pfieffer museum in Piggot, Arkansas, and now, the August 2014 issue celebrates the museum’s 15-year anniversary. Guest edited by Adam Long, current museum directly, the issue contains “essays, images and creative pieces that evoke the Hemingway-Pfeiffer connection and updates the scholarship on Hemingway’s creative output during the years he spent as part of the Pfeiffer family.”

Literature in the Age of STEM

Well, if this isn’t a “must read” in our age of STEM and “how will that degree get you a job” mentality toward college:  The Second Greatest Psychologist of All Time  by Michael Karson, Ph.D., J.D., who begins his article , “One of the main reasons I switched my major in college from English literature to psychology was that I was worried about making a living.”

So on my list of great psychologists, I would put George Eliot, Shakespeare, and Leo Tolstoy near the top. I would literally prefer that my students read Middlemarch, the great tragedies, War and Peace, and Anna Karenina than any psychology book, even my own (except Skinner’s Science and Human Behavior). The Magic Years by Selma Fraiberg is a wonderful professional book about childhood and its passing, but Stephen King’s It and Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn are even better and they’re more fun to read. The list of important works on attachment theory is lengthy, and you ought to know it if you want to look credentialed, but if you really want to understand attachment, you won’t do any better than Lionel Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin. There’s a terrific corpus of work available on family dynamics, but as glad as I am that I’ve read some of it, I’ve gotten even more mileage in my consultation and therapy work out of reading Junichuro Tanazaki’s The Makioka Sisters.

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

It wasn’t my intention when I started posting covers here, but it seems I found myself in a “white” theme that worked out fairly well for the week.

nowhere

The cover of Nowhere Number 12, an online journal of literary travel writing, is a strongly composed image of balanced whites and beige. A very simple but striking image, a still life that moves the reader to travel to the inside.

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permafrost

This rainbow greyhound on the cover of the Winter 2014 Permafrost issue is a stand out. Of course, generally anything with a dog will garner my attention.

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literaryreview

The Literary Review‘s Summer 2014 cover is in keeping with the publication’s theme, “The Glutton’s Kitchen: Tales of Insatiable Hunger.”

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chagrin-river-review

To finish out the covers comes this one from the online publication Chagrin River Review, which features a painting by JenMarie Zeleznak.

Call for Non-Fiction Digital Stories

Afterlife of Discarded Objects is “a digital non-fiction storytelling project that explores the stories that discarded objects can tell about our history. The project will examine how people’s memories of their childhood games with discarded material objects inform the way they imagine the cultural landscape of their childhood.”

Curated by Natalia Andrievskikh, Fulbright alumna and a doctoral candidate in the Department of Comparative Literature at Binghamton University, plans are to transfer stories “onto an interactive map where users will be able to click on marked locations and read stories from that location.” Andrievskikh will also reflect on the shared stories in the book that she is am currently working on, titled “Afterlife of Discarded Objects.”

Students at Risk: A Letter to MFA Programs

open-minds-quarterlyOpen Minds Quarterly is a publication whose content continually and consistently packs some of the hardest-hitting writing I’ve ever read, with its unabashed focus on the poetry and literature of mental health recovery. The Summer 2014 issue is no exception, with one feature in particular that might well strike a deep chord with many of our readers: “An Open Letter to the MFA” by Hannah Baggott. Written in the epistolary style, Baggott addresses the stresses and pressures MFA students face in their programs. While often told to “take care of yourself first,” Baggott confronts the contradictory nature the expectations of such programs foster. “Our workshop leader last term said you have to be sad to write well. This is the fallacy that you keep perpetuating.” Baggot is “happy” in her program and “would not choose a different path,” but she does offer some advice that if the MFA programs themselves won’t follow, then the individuals in them should seriously consider how to better “take care.”

Roxane Gay on Food & Family & Loving Hard

tin-house-v16-n1-fall-2014The most recent issue of Tin House (v16 n1), themed “Tribes,” features an essay in the Readable Feast section by Roxane Gay, “The Island We Are: At Home with Food.” The quote line the magazine chose was “When you are overweight in a Haitian family, your body is a family concern.” That caught my interest (well, and of course, it’s Roxane Gay for cripes sake), but what stuck with me throughout her piece was the repetition of ‘loving, and loving hard’:

“We talk about our lives. We debate and try to solve the world’s problems. We are a holy space. We love each other hard.”

Following the “overweight” quote, Gay writes: “Everyone – siblings, parents, aunts, uncles, grandmotehrs, cousins – has an opinion, judgement, or counsel. They mean well. We love hard, and that love is inescapable.”

“They want to help. I accept this, or I try to.”

“As I eat the foods of my childhood prepared by my own hand, I am filled with longing, as well as a quiet anger that has risen from hard love and good intentions.”

Her writing is a mirror of that: subtle, persistent in keeping you reading, and hard hitting in its meaning, which isn’t at all sneaky. It’s there throughout, and you can’t help but to keep reading it, wanting to be a part of it, loving it.

Poetry Postcard Festival 2014 Wrap Up

WP 20140907 006It was another great year for the August Poetry Postcard Festival! Organized by west coast poet and teacher Paul E. Nelson, over 300 people from a dozen countries signed up to write a postcard a day and send it to someone in the month of August.

As of today, I’ve received 22 postcards of the 31 expected. I imagine a few more will trickle in, considering the countries they are coming from may take a bit longer, and, well, if some were like me, that ‘poem a day’ promise might have slipped a bit. I did send a couple out a few days into September.

But I did send all 31! And it’s an amazing feeling to be doing it, struggling to do it some days (maybe a few times even resenting the guilt feeling when I didn’t do it), and when it’s all done, feeling a bit forlorn.

The premise is simple but challenging: put a poem on a postcard and send it. Postcards aren’t that big, so it’s not that much to write. Still, the intention is to just sit and write daily – a necessity writers understand as such but still seem to struggle with as if some kind of luxury.

My own poems came to me in two ways. On my morning walks, I might see something that would cause me to reflect on the image and feeling in language, or a line would simply jump into my head, like this one: “It was summer when you said you would…” That’s not a line that has any connection to anything in my life, it was just language that formed that thought and then became the poem about broken promises. As soon as I got home from my walk, I’d be jotting down lines, then rummaging for a postcard and getting it down as a poem.

The other way the poems came to me was simply sitting down with the postcard and writing using the image on the card as a kind of prompt. Sometimes I wrote on the front of the card right on the image, sometimes on the back. But it was from my mind to the pen to the paper. The only editing I did happened when I reread the poem and would scribble out or correct a mistake, or simply try to make the writing more legible.

I type up and save all of the poems I write. I make note of who I sent them to and the date as well as any notes about the card that may have prompted the poem. Going back and rereading these for the past seven years is a fun reflection. There’s some really bad poetry in there, and yet, there’s some pretty good stuff too.

And what else I have is a box of great poetry from other writers. I love going back through those cards, from so many people from so many countries. Some were famous then, some have become famous since. Some are unsigned and I’ll never know who wrote them. But all of them are truly wonderful works – not just as poetry, good or bad, but in knowing there are so many others out there who would do this. Who would take time from their day to get themselves to write and to share. It’s an amazingly warm and comforting experience to feel this kind of connection with total strangers. But then, isn’t that the power of poetry? Of poets?

I’m happy to have completed PPF 2014 and appreciative of all the others who did the same. I look forward to this event every year. Huge thanks to Paul Nelson for taking it over.

See you in August 2015!

Celebrating Grad Student Writing :: The Masters Review

masters-reviewNow in its third volume, The Masters Review is a collection of ten stories from students in graduate-level creative writing programs across the country (MFA, MA, PhD). Selected by such well-known authors as Lauren Groff (Volume I), AM Homes (Volume II), previously featured authors have gone on to publish novels, short story collections, and win awards, including a Nelson Algren Award finalist, an Academy of American Poets Prize winner, and a Fulbright Fellow. Many have gone on to continue their publishing in literary journals nation wide.

Volume III, with stories selected by Lev Grossman, New York Times bestselling author and Times book critic, includes Drew Ciccolo (Rutgers-Newark University College; MFA), Amanda Pauley (Hollins University; MFA), Eric Howerton (University of Houston; PhD), Maya Perez (Michener Center for Writer; MFA), Shane R. Collins (Stonecoast University of Southern Maine; MFA), Courtney Kersten (University of Idaho; MFA), Meng Jin (Hunter College; MFA), Joe Worthen (University of North Carolina Wilmington; MFA), Andrew MacDonald (University of Massachusetts Amherst; MFA), Dana Xin (University of Montana; MFA).

In addition to its annual anthology, The Masters Review also accepts submissions year round for its regular online feature New Voices. This is open to any new or emerging author who was not published a work of fiction or narrative nonfiction of novel length. Fiction or narrative nonfiction up to 5000 words accepted for New Voices pays .10/word up to $200 with no submission fee.

October Writer’s Regimen Sign Up Now

Twice annually, The Southeast Review Writer’s Regimen is a 30-day set of emails containing daily writing prompts, a daily reading-writing exercise, a Riff Word of the Day, a Podcast of the Day, a Quote of the Day, craft talks, weekly messages from poets and writers – tips and warnings on the craft and business of writing, a dedicated Writer’s Regimen contest for a chance to have work published, a print copy of a current or back issue, and access to the online literary companion.

Gees! Is that enough?! All  for only $15 starting October 1.

It’s like boot camp for writers! Teachers: This could BE your class for the month! Students: What a great way to supplement your classes! Writers: Make October your best month by signing up now!

The First Line Tries The Last Line

first-lineSince 1999, The First Line magazine has been issuing the starting point for writers to engage their creativity and publishing the finished works to share with readers the many different directions writers can take when given the same start point. After so long a successful run of sharing first lines (like the one for the next issue: “We went as far as the car would take us.”), The First Line is ready to mix it up a bit.

The Last Line is an “experiment” to see how writers respond to using the prompt as the final sentence of the story. The guidelines are the same (300-5000 words), and the editors will publish selected works in a December issue. If it seems to go well, there may be more in store for last line writers and readers. The experimental last line: “Brian pocketed the note and realized it had all been worth it.”

Start the creative engines and put it in reverse! Submissions are due October 1, 2014.

Bonus: The editors are looking for a creative cover idea for The Last Line issue. Visit their website here.

Allen Ginsberg Poetry Award Winners

The newest issue of Paterson Literary Review (#42) features the 2013 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Award winners, including the full list of honorable mentions and editor’s choice selections. In the top tier:

paterson-literary-reviewFIRST PRIZE (shared)
Svea Barrett, Fair Lawn, NJ
Grace Cavalieri, Annapolis, MD

SECOND PRIZE (shared)
Charles H. Johnson, Hillsborough, NJ
Carolyn Pettit Pinet, Bozeman, MT

THIRD PRIZE
Alice Jay, Miami, FL

More information about the prize as well as the full list of winners can be found here.

Big Fiction 2014 Knickerbocker Prize Winner

big fiction thumbThe most recent issue of Big Fiction (No. 6) features the winners of the 2014 Knickerbocker Prize, selected by David James Poissant. Poissnat provides an introduction to the winners: Alan Sincic, first place for his novella “The Babe” and Margaret Luongo, second place for her novella “Three Portraits of Elaine Shapiro.”

Big Fiction publishes long-form fiction in a twice yearly print publication, paying $100 and six copies for selected works, and $500/$250 +publication for contest winners.

News from New English Review

new-england-review-v35-n2-2014New England Review poetry editor C. Dale Young will be leaving the publication’s masthead after the next issue (35.3), closing out nineteen years with NER. That issue, the editors promise, will be a memorable one in honor of Young’s legacy.

Joining the publication in her new role as international correspondent is Ellen Hinsey, based in Paris since 1987. Hinsey will be “looking to make connections between authors and translators, editors and readers. She keeps her ear to the ground and her eye on the bigger picture.”

And behind the scenes, Middlebury College has had great success in establishing an Editor’s Fund in honor of Stephen Donadio’s twenty years as editor. The fund will help to offset annual expenses.

Keeping Rejection Classy

carveCarve Magazine takes the “Classy” award for their treatment of works their own editors have rejected. REJECT! is a regular feature in the Carve Premium Edition (lots of free content online, but some is only in the paid-for premium edition – a move that seems quite fair, actually, so don’t kvetch). In it, the publication features an author whose work Carve readers had previously rejected but was selected for publication elsewhere.

Their reason for doing this beyond an exercise in pure humility? To show how NORMAL rejection is, how editors preferences can indeed be “subjective and varied,” and to actually encourage writers to keep trying if they want to be successful.

The latest issue features feedback the Carve reading committee had provided to author Lynn Levin, her response to the feedback, and an excerpt of her story, “A Visit to the Old House,” which was subsequently published in Rathalla Review, Spring 2014. The notes include when the story was rejected and whether or not the author had revised the piece.

I applaud Carve for providing such a constructively cool feature in their publication. So often, rejections leave writers disheartened and bitter toward the very community in which they wish to participate. This approach provides a unique perspective from the editors and publishers that is both humbling as well as encouraging, upping the conversation from ranting to professional.

Thanks, Carve, for keeping it classy!

Revision :: Kick in the Pants

According to writer Amina Gautier in the September Glimmer Train Bulletin (#92):

amina gautierRevision is the kick in the pants that propels the writer out of complacence, jars him from the euphoria that tends to come when he thinks he’s completed something. Revision is the inevitable and necessary faceoff between one’s lazy writer self who defends the good enough draft, “This sentence / passage / description / scene / character is fine the way it is” and one’s higher writing self who argues, “Yes, it’s good enough and it says what I want, but does it say it in the right way? Does it say it in the best way”

Read the whole craft essay here: Joy of Revision (yes, Joy!).

Native Lit in the 21st Century

World Literature Today‘s most recent issue (September-October 2014) features an examination of Native Literature in the 21st Century. More complex than it may seem, editor Daniel Simon establishes that WLT means to present “international Indigenous literatures” and asks: “is there such a thing as global Native literature?” He comments further “When one reads the latest theories about what constitutes the vexed category of ‘world literature.’ Not only are Native literatures rarely factored in to those discussions, they are often absent altogether. Moreover, Indigenous writers might be forgiven for wanting to resist being co-opted into a theoretical paradigm that has long been dominated by Eurocentric (even neocolonialist) thinking.” WLT has long made its place in showcasing global Indeginous literatures for their qualities of literary expression, regardless of author ‘label.’ This issue is no exception and only further establishes exactly this practice of recognition.

New Pushkin Translation

pushkinThe most recent issue of The Hudson Review (Summer 2014) features three stories by Alexander Pushkin from a new translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The stories, “The Blizzard,” “The Staionmaster,” and “The Young Lady Peasant,” are three of the five Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin (1830), Pushkin’s first finished prose works. Pevear notes these stories were written in “an extraordinarily productive period for Pushkin, when a quarantine confined him for two months to his estate in Boldino. He ascribed the authorship to a rather simple country gentleman, Ivan Petrovich Belkin, who, in a brief introduction, is said to have written them down from the account of local inhabitants.” The works were first “considered mere anecdotes,” but have since been recognized as “unsurpassed” narrative constructions “in the whole range of Russian literature,” according to D.S. Mirsky, Pushkin biographer.

Poetry & The News

rattle-45-fall-2014Thanks to Rattle, “poetry is back in the news” with their online feature Poets Respond. While the editors of Rattle believe that “real poetry is timeless,” there is great opportunity to respond and participate in the conversation of current events that does need to be given a more immediate space. To resolve this, Rattle now publishes poetic responses every Sunday to a public event that has occurred with the last week.

In addition to the written work, Rattle also includes an audio of the poet reading for most of the poems. Some recent features: Mark Smith-Soto “Streamers” – in response to birds in California being ignited in flight by solar panels; Sonia Greenfield “Corpse Flower” – In Memoriam James Foley; Gabrielle Bates “Of the Lamp” – For Robin Williams; Jason McCall “Roll Call for Michael Brown”; Marjorie Lotfi Gill “Picture of Girl and Small Boy (Burij, Gaza).”

Selected poets receive $25. Submissions must be received before Friday midnight.

Changes at The Conium Review

coniumThe Conium Review has recently undergone some major changes – not only skin deep, but beneath the surface as well. In addition to their new website (some bugs still being worked out), the publication will now publish fiction only and will begin featuring flash fiction online. Conium will still publish in print, moving from biannaul to annual, but with the unique twist that they will publish two editions of their annual: a standard edition and a collector’s edition, which they claim will be “the coolest book you own.”

American Life in Poetry :: Matt Mason

American Life in Poetry: Column 493
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

Stories read to us as children can stay with us all our lives. Robert McCloskey’s Lentil was especially influential for me, and other books have helped to shape you. Here’s Matt Mason, who lives in Omaha, with a book that many of you will remember.

The Story of Ferdinand the Bull

Dad would come home after too long at work
and I’d sit on his lap to hear
the story of Ferdinand the Bull; every night,
me handing him the red book until I knew
every word, couldn’t read,
just recite along with drawings
of a gentle bull, frustrated matadors
the all-important bee, and flowers—
flowers in meadows and flowers
thrown by the Spanish ladies.
Its lesson, really,
about not being what you’re born into
but what you’re born to be,
even if that means
not caring about the capes they wave in your face
or the spears they cut into your shoulders.
And Dad, wonderful Dad, came home
after too long at work
and read to me
the same story every night
until I knew every word, couldn’t read,
just recite.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2013 by Matt Mason from his most recent book of poems, The Baby That Ate Cincinnati, Stephen F. Austin State University Press, 2013. Poem reprinted by permission of Matt Mason and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

superstition review

Is it a jinx or good luck to select Issue 13 of Superstition Review to feature for cover of the week? I’m going with luck considering the beauty of Melinda Hackett’s watercolor. More of her works, along with those from a number of other artists, can be found featured in this online publication.

 
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big fiction thumb

Big Fiction‘s cover caught my eye and my touch, being hand-set letterpress printed by Bremelo Press. Maybe selecting it is cheating just a bit, because it’s a cover that really deserves to held to be best appreciated. Here is is full print, unfolded. Truly, letterpress is art.

big fiction

 
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west marin review

The cover of West Marin Review Volume 5 made me smile, reminding me of high school days gone by (and maybe a few college days) of sneaking in or breaking in after finding myself locked out. Jasmine Bravo, Grade 12, Tomales High School contributed this digital photograph entitled “Sister’s Keychain” (2013).

 
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poetry northwest

Poetry Northwest Summer & Fall 2014 features the stunning marine photography by Adam Summers: “Hedgehog Skate.” More inside the publication as well.

Glimmer Train June Fiction Winners

Glimmer Train has just chosen the winning stories for their June Fiction Open competition. This competition is held twice a year. Stories generally range from 2000-6000 words, though up to 20,000 is fine. The next Fiction Open will take place in June. Glimmer Train’s monthly submission calendar may be viewed here.

Varga PWFirst place: Michael Varga [pictured, of Norcross, GA, wins $2500 for “Chad Erupts in Strife.” His story will be published in Issue 95 of Glimmer Train Stories. This will be his first off-campus fiction in print.

Second place: Dana Kroos, of Houston, TX, wins $1000 for “These Things.”

Third place: Christine Breede-Schechter, of Geneva, Switzerland, wins $600 for “Goodbye to All That (Or Not).”

A PDF of the Top 25 winners can be found here. Deadline soon approaching – Short Story Award for New Writers: August 31.

This competition is held quarterly and is open to all writers whose fiction has not appeared in a print publication with a circulation over 5000. No theme restrictions. Most submissions to this category run 1500-5000 words, but can go up to 12,000. First place prize is $1500 and publication in Glimmer Train Stories. Second/third: $500/$300 and consideration for publication. Click here for complete guidelines.

Literature, Arts, & Medicine Research Database

I post this every fall because I think this is such a GREAT resource for academics: Literature, Arts, and Medicine.  This site is sponsored by New York University. Time and again, when working on analysis of literature, this site pops up, and I have found it immensely helpful in guiding some of my work. Specifically, “The Literature, Arts, & Medicine Database is an annotated multimedia listing of prose, poetry, film, video and art that was developed to be a dynamic, accessible, comprehensive resource for teaching and research in MEDICAL HUMANITIES, and for use in health/pre-health, graduate and undergraduate liberal arts and social science settings.”

Fine for med students, as a lit student/teacher, this site works great for me! Each entry specifies genre (including medium for art), keywords (which help direct analysis from a medical perspective and are linked to others with the same theme), summary and commentary. Bibliographic information is also provided.

Pea River Journal :: The Prints Project

Trish HarrisAnn Akhmatov PrintWhat happens when you send artwork to a writer and ask them simply to “respond”? Pea River Journal Editor Trish Harris found out after creating four original linocut and woodblock print portraits of famous authors and sending them to writers with no requirements whatsoever except: respond. So far the series of 12 includes four authors: Ann Akhmatova, Walt Whitman, Ezra Pound, and Emily Dickinson. Ten of each, signed and numbered copies, are sent out “into the world,” with a new release of ten planned every few weeks. As the responses come in, PRJis sharing them for readers here. Respondents thus far include Ab Davis, Laura Esckelson, Anthony Martin, John G. Rodwan, Jr., Edward Hunt, Corey Mesler, Jose Padua, Leslie Anne Mcilroy, Timothy Kenny, and Heather Hallberg Yanda.

Why Aren’t You Reading Writer Beware®?

Writer Beware®: The Blog is sponsored by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, with additional support from the Mystery Writers of America and the Horror Writers Association: “Shining a bright light into the dark corners of the shadow-world of literary scams, schemes, and pitfalls. Also providing advice for writers, industry news and commentary, and a special focus on the weird and wacky things that happen at the fringes of the publishing world.”

A recent post by Victoria Strauss is one that answers a question I have heard time and again: How Not to Seek a Literary Agent: The Perils of “Middleman” Services. Strauss begins: “I know I’ve written about this before [this links to a previous article]. But I’m seeing an increasing number of these kinds of ‘services,’ and they are all worthless.”

Death of Humanities and Lit Flipping

Paula Reiter, Mount Mary University, speaks in a video on “Creative Teaching Techniques: Flipping the Literature Classroom” addressing “the challenge of infusing the literature classroom with creative teaching techniques.” Reiter notes, “I demonstrate how to ‘flip’ the classroom to make time for extended creative projects that involve students directly.” Even more importantly, Reiter addresses the major concern/criticism of literature in our time: Why does this matter in my life?

Access this an numerous other pedagogy articles in Teaching College Literature, an online professional publication which is open to submissions, such as sample syllabi, advice on course planning and design, teaching tips, media (PowerPoint, video, etc.), as well as suggestions for links to resources including blogs, websites and media.

Hear This :: “Butcher Day” by Kami Westoff

The 2River View online publication of poetry, art, and theory, includes audio recordings for each of its featured poets. Each poet reads his or her own works, introducing themselves by name and title of poem. My general instinct when I find a site where an audio starts up immediately is to look for the X button to make it stop. There is no such option on The 2River View, and perturbed at first, I was grateful once I listened through “Butcher Day” by Kami Westhoff. This poem was a stunner for me. It is haunting enough in its shift between contextual imagery, but the audio recording takes all its content a step further for the reader’s experience. Westhoff’s reading aloud forced me to continue at a steady pace through the connections she makes, from the slaughter of a family cow, to the rape of her sister, to their innocence as children:

Today is butcher day. Clover drags her impossible tongue over the salt lick, slips it into one then the other nostril. Our dog, Blackie, burrows into a bone from last night’s roast, her teeth clunk low and wet until the marrow offers. . . 

. . .Today we are eight and twelve, and don’t yet know there is never enough time to be forgiven.

Her reading added to the emotional gravity of the poem, which by the end had gripped me so strongly, I was on the verge of tears. Like many of the poets in this issue, Westhoff has a second poem, which the recording went directly into. I had to hit the mute button on the computer to give myself “a moment” to let that poem resonate before moving on. Other poets in this issue include Bradley J. Fest, Kathryn Haemmerle, April Krivensky, Kristin LaFollette, Michael Lauchlan, Gloria Monaghan, Darren Morris, Sherry O’Keefe, Jacqueline Dee Parker, Sally Van Doren, Kami Westhoff.

Beecher’s Contest Winners

Beecher‘s Spring 2014 issue publishes the winners of their recent contests in poetry, nonfiction, and fiction:

Poetry Contest Winner, selected by Frank X. Walker
Roy Beckemeyer’s “Tree Shadows“
“tree shadows
                   angle
    their     skeletal souls
          like  Chinese
        script….”

Nonfiction Contest Winner, selected by Eula Biss
Anne Penniston Grunsted’s “The Art of Not Turning Away”
“My five-year-old son Bobby has terrible, all-consuming anxiety at the doctor’s office. Any doctor can trigger him—his doctor, my doctor, a vet. As soon as he realizes where he is, he starts to retch. I hold him. I distract him. I gently whisper calm assurances. His service dog sits near, providing comfort the best he can. Nothing, really, helps. We just wait together for the anxiety to pass…”

Fiction Contest Winner, selected Manuel Munoz
Penny Perkins’s “Car Ride Through Corn Fields (1975)”
“She is sitting in the backseat of the family station wagon. Her father is driving an scratching himself. Her mother is in the front seat next to her father, wearing sunglasses over puffy, red-stained eyes and looking straight ahead at the lonely two-lane highway that stretches out before them on the flat, Midwestern plain. She is a child, almost a teenager. She is the almost-teenager child of her parents and there is no escaping that oppressive fact. Even now, especially now, here on a teary Sunday afternoon drive.

Musicworks Music Sampler

musicworksKeeping with its tagline, “Exploration in Sound,” Musicworks truly does provide music “for curious ears.” Based in Canada with subscription service to the US, each of the three issues per year includes a sampler CD of some truly unique music. In an almost overwhelming abundance of “new” to listen to from around the globe, Musicworks presentation is a helpful sifting of great art. Some of the tracks are available for listening on their website, but, for the truly ecclectic, two seconds into the first track on CD #119 (Jerusalem in My Heart – using buzuk, Analog Solutions Telemark synth, Oberheim two-voice synth and voice, and tape delay) should have you looking to have this publication delivered to your doorstep. As with any sampler, there may be some that don’t quite suit, but that’s what I love about samplers: the ability to try something completely new. There were a few I wouldn’t necessarily choose to listen to again – but I did enjoy them for the artistic quality and unique approach.

From their website: “For over thirty years Musicworks magazine has been dedicated to the development of new and passionate audiences for experimental music. Promoting both emerging and established experimental musicians, Musicworks features composers, improvisers, instrument designers, and artists who work in genres such as radio, electroacoustics, concert music, sound installation, and sound sculpture. This tri-annual magazine, along with its curated CDs, dynamic website and outreach programs creates an inclusive community within which to exchange and develop ideas, and tantalize curious listeners with adventurous music.”

Trust a Librarian? Who, me?

After yet another season of school boards banning books most of them have never bothered to read for themselves (except, oddly enough, for all the naughty bits), Don Flood’s commentary in the Cape Gazette provides a thoughtful response, exemplifying the professional respect librarians (and educators) deserve:

Perhaps I’m going out on a limb here, but it is my belief that librarians don’t choose their career out of a desire to destroy the minds and corrupt the values of our nation’s youth. They become librarians because of a deep, passionate interest in reading and education, a desire to help students develop into intelligent adults who think for themselves.

Read the rest here: Districts Should Take Advantage of Librarian’s Expertise

Summer Writing Prompts on Ploughshares

Summer-Inspired Writing Prompts posted by Anca Szilagyi on the Ploughshares Blog includes short lists of prompts for five-minute prompts (#1 List all the scary things you associate with summer.), ten-minute prompts (#5 Describe the weirdest summer camp you can imagine.), and twenty-minute or longer prompts (#2 Write a story around the ideas of ripening and rotting.). There’s still plenty of summer left to use these motivators, and bring an end to any summer writing procrastination!