Eight Years of The Write Place at the Write Time

write placeThis week marks the eight-year anniversary of online literary magazine The Write Place at the Write Time, founded July 3rd 2008. In those eight years, the journal has been read in 80 countries, and the editors have published 29 issues with over 338 contributors of ranging ages, cultures, and publication credits. More than producing a literary magazine, the editors have also organized projects throughout the years, such as a Filmed Poetry Reading, a Pay-It-Forward Initiative, a Twitter Tales experiment where a group of writers created a story via tweets, and more.

To celebrate the anniversary, check out the Spring/Summer 2016 issue, which includes new fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and art, with an anniversary scrapbook that looks back at past anniversaries. The Writers Craft Box features an opportunity for writers to explore the significance of numbers for a prize, and in interviews, Tracy Chevalier, author of Girl with a Pearl Earring, discusses her latest novel, At the Edge of the Orchard, as well as the themes found in her work.

Happy anniversary, The Write Place at the Write Time. We at NewPages wish you many more years to come.

Of Rivers Chapbook Special Feature

southern humanities reviewThe newest issue of Southern Humaniites Review (v49 n2) includes a special poetry section of selections from Of River, a chapbook edited by Chiyuma Elliot and Katie Peterson, who also each contribute a piece.The entire chapbook is available to read for free online here. The editors open the collection with this explanation:

We began with Langston Hughes’s 1921 award-winning poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” and the charge to write something in response. There was something in the invitation about nature poetry and how that seemed important, but otherwise the instructions were open-ended (perhaps scarily so). We asked poets of very different styles and sensibilities, only some of whom were already engaged with Hughes’s work: F. Douglas Brown, Jericho Brown, Katie Ford, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Derrick Harriell, Dong Li, Sandra Lim, and Michael C. Peterson. We wanted to see what each of these writers would make. In both the individual poems and the group as a whole, we weren’t disappointed; the poems ask, reach, and posit literary relationship in phenomenally different ways.

The Louisville Review :: Kid’s Corner Spring 2016

louisville review n79 spring 2016The Louisville Review accepts submissions from students in grades K-12 to feature in “The Children’s Corner” section of the journal. In the Spring 2016 issue, four young writers were published:

Kate Busatto, “The Communion”

Kiran Damodaran, “Collision Theory”

Andrew D. Swann, “Jelly Dreams,” “God Didn’t Make the World Round,” and “Worn and Broken”

Isabel Young, “Our Romance is Kamikaze:”

Get a copy of The Louisville Review to check out these new writers.

 

Poetry Magazine June 2016 Cover Art

poetry v208 n3 june 2016The June 2016 issue of Poetry features cover art by Anna Maria Maiolino. On Harriet: The Blog, Fred Sasaki provides more information about this artist who, it turns out, also creates visual and written poetry with all her works considered to be “poetic actions.”

Maiolino speaks about her series Photopoemaction, from which the June 2016 cover art comes:

“The photographic series Fotopoemação is a result of the elaboration of images that emerged from my written poems. [ . . . ] These series, other than constituting a challenge to the poetic labour, are efficient instruments of both innovation and freedom. They result from thinking about the things of the world, from the attempt to transform what we live through into consciousness in a poetic operational movement of conduct.”

Check out the full blog post to read more, or stop by the Poetry webpage to listen to this month’s podcast and check out the work inside the June 2016 issue.

Ninth Letter’s 2015 Literary Award Runners-Up

ninth letterAmong the blue-font decorated pages of the latest issue of Ninth Letter, readers will find an art feature and interview with Bert Stabler and Katie Fizdale, a look at Detroit by Caitlin McGuire in the “Where We’re At” section, and the 2015 Literary Award Runners-Up, listed below.

Creative Nonfiction:

Julie Marie Wade, “The Regulars”

Fiction:

Zach VandeZande, “Status Updates”

Poetry:

Monica Sok, “Here Is Your Name”

Rachael Katz, “All About Flash”

Check out all the other goodies inside this new, shiny (no, really, it’s literally shiny) issue of Ninth Letter and grab yourself a copy.

RHINO 2016 Prize Winners

rhino 2016The 2016 issue of RHINO is out and includes the 2016 Editors’ Prize winners and the 2016 Founders’ Prize winners inside.

Editors’ Prizes 2016:

First Prize

Lee Sharkey, “Tashlich”

Second Prize

Catherine Wing, “Report from the Neandertal Mind”

Honorable Mention

Teresa Dzieglewicz, “Stranger, thank you for giving me this body”

Translation Prize

Anonymous translated from the Anglo-Saxson by Bill Christopherson, “The Seafarer”

Founders’ Prize 2016:

First Prize

Greg Grummer, “The Great Butterfly Collapse”

Runners-Up

Katie Hartsock, “On the Heat of Upstate Travel in the Advancing Polar Air”

Teresa Dzieglewicz, “St. Maria Goretti speaks to the girl”

Readers can find these poems on the RHINO website, with a full table of contents linking to the writers’ websites.

december’s 2016 Jeff Marks Memorial Poetry Prize Winners

december v27 n1 spring summer 2016The Spring/Summer 2016 issue of december features the winner and finalists of the Jeff Marks Memorial Poetry Prize (with submissions opening back up in autumn). This year, the magazine received over 1,200 contest entries, which were then narrowed down to 20 semi-finalists. From these selections, judge Marge Piercy selected the following for the winner, honorable mentions, and finalists.

First Place:

Jim Dwyer, “Enlightenment”

Honorable Mention:

Kate Gray, “Reassurance” and “For Every Girl”

Finalists:

José Angel Araguz, “Cazar Means to Hunt Not to Marry”

Debbie Benson, “Uchi Vallai”

Kierstin Bridger, “Preparing to Sink”

Tova Green, “March Storm at Abbots Lagoon”

John McCarthy, “What I mean When I Say I Don’t Box Anymore”

M.H. Perry, “Cardamom, Osprey, Banff, Us”

Cocoa M. Williams, “Leda on a Stoop in St. Bernard Projects (1974)”

Grab a copy of december’s Spring/Summer 2016 issue to read these poems.

Concho River Review Celebrates 30 Years

concho river review v30 n1 spring 2016Concho River Review recently launched their Spring 2016 issue which marks the beginning of their 30th year of publication. With the first issue released in the spring of 1987, founder Terry Dalrymple expected the journal to last for only five years. Now, he estimates CRR has published around 7000 pages throughout the years with 250 pieces of fiction, 900 poems, 200 pieces of nonfiction, and 300 book reviews. Whew!

Happy anniversary, Concho River Review. We hope to see you around for many more years (and pages).

Agni Online Exclusives

agniAgni Online offers free access to fiction, poetry and essays as an extension of their print publication. These contributions are offered exclusively online, and recent works include “Pinays” an essay by Ricco Villanueva Siasoco; “Seam Ripper” flash fiction by Kathryn Hill; “I Fell Asleep Among the Horses” poem by Kathryn Starbuck; “One Hundred Years of Solitude, or The Importance of a Story” an essay by Oksana Zabuzhko; “Sibboleth” an essay by Dan Beachy-Quick; “First Boyfriend” a poem by Chase Twichell; and “Jury Duty” a story by William Virgil Davis.

The Common Contemporary Arabic Stories

commonIssue number 11 of The Common is co-edited by Acker and prominent Jordanian author Hisham Bustani is titled “Tajdeed: Contemporary Arabic Fiction.” The publication features the work of 31 contributors from 15 Middle Eastern countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen all translated for contemporary English-speaking audiences.

Teachers: The Common in the Classroom provides a way to introduce your students to global literature. Students recieve a discounted subscription price (2 issues) and you recieve a desk copy and sample lesson plans along with an in-person or Skype visit from Editor in Chief Jennifer Acker, or one of the publications participating authors.

The Missouri Review 2015 Jeffery E. Smith Prize Winners

missouri review spring 2016The Spring 2016 issue of The Missouri Review is titled “Wonders and Relics” and some of the wonders readers can find in the issue include the winners of the 2015 Jeffrey E. Smith Editor’s Prize.

Fiction Winner:

Emma Törzs, “The Wall”

Poetry Winner:

Phillip B. Williams, Four Poems

Essay Winner:

Genese Grill, “Portals: Cabinets of Curiosity, Reliquaries, and Colonialism”

Excerpts from the winning pieces and a foreword by the magazine’s editor, Speer Morgan, can be found on The Missouri Review website.

Carolina Quarterly Artist Monica Canilao

slabfortMonica Canilao’s art is featured on the cover of The Carlolina Quarterly Summer 2016 issue, and even though is only a section of a larger work, I was struck immediately by the image. Canilao is an artist who describes her work as “stitching, painting, printing, and breathing life into the refuse that dominates our time and place.” The Carolina Quarterly provides Canilao 16 full-color pages in addition to the artist’s introduction, in which she writes: “My art practice is a way to generate a personal and living history. My community and collaborators, my roots and their neraly lost traditions, my neighborhood and its trash piles are all integral, necessay parts of my life and art.” A quick internet search of Monica Canilao provides a wealth of images of her work, from the canvas to murals in city buildings, installations within building spaces, and into the desert. Originally from Califormia but spending time in Detroit, Michigan, I was pleased with this introduciton to her work; I hope to see more of it in the future – perhaps even in real life.

Image: Slab City desert, part of a collaborative project with photographer Aaron Huey for the forthcoming book Shelter. The home Canilao built also doubled as a set for a short film called Bring Water, in which she played a role.

The Fiddlehead’s 25th Annual Literary Competition Winners

fiddlehead 267 spring 2016The Spring 2016 issue of The Fiddlehead features the winners of their 25th annual literary competition:

Ralph Gustafson Prize for Best Poem

Michael Eden Reynolds, “False Dichotomy or Monocot”

Honorable Mentions

Alison Goodwin, “Consumed”

Jeff Parent, “Made By Robots”

Short Fiction First Prize:

Brent van Staalduinen, “Skinks”

Honorable Mentions

Sarah L. Taggart, “The Way It Is In A Place Like This”

Cathy Kozak, “Dirty Girls of Paradise”

These works can be read on The Fiddlehead website along with commentary from Editor Ross Leckie on the winning entries.

Rattle Features Los Angeles Poets

rattleIn addition to the open poetry contributions, Rattle #52 features a tribute to 21 Los Angeles poets, and an interview with L.A. native-born poet Brendan Constantine, author of collections Letters to Guns (2009), Birthday Girl With Possum (2011), and Calamity Joe (2012).

Rattle editors write, “Los Angeles is our home city, but we’re an international magazine and not especially sociable, so we wanted to peek in and see what’s happening in the local scene. Greater Los Angeles is home to almost 20 million people, including a very eclectic but widely dispersed poetry community: Take your pick of the many poetry readings and open mics happening daily—but good luck driving there! It’s also a city full of complicated history and cinematic beauty. As always, we put out an open call for submissions, and were impressed with what Angeleno poets had to offer, including a love poem for Los Angeles by L.A. Poet Laureate Luis J. Rodriguez.”

Other Angelenos featured inclue: Resa Alboher, Allan Aquino, Chanel Brenner, Brendan Constantine, Jack Cooper, Alejandro Escudé, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Alan Fox, Jack Grapes, Ron Koertge, Deborah P. Kolodji, Lester Graves Lennon, Ruth Madievsky, Risa Potters, Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Lynne Thompson, Amy Uyematsu, Charles Harper Webb, Mari Werner, and Cecelia Woloch.

Michigan Quarterly Review Flint and Beyond

michigan quarterly reviewThe Spring 2016 issue of Michigan Quarterly Review provides witness to the travesty of the water crisis in Flint, Michigan – only a stone’s throw from MQR’s home in Ann Arbor. Jonathan Freedman addresses the issue using Michigan’s state promotional campaign slogan “Pure Michigan” – aptly titling his editorial “Impure Michigan.”

Like many who respond to this man-made disaster, Freedman points the blame directly as it should be: “The real impurity, then, extends from the polluted water to the polluted political system that allowed emergency managers to run cities without being answerable to them, to the cover-their-ass bureaucracy, to the governor who reverses Harry Truman’s credo by whining that the buck stops everywhere but his desk. The real impurity is the stupidity, selfishness and racism that is structural to the politcal system in this and far too many states.”

Included in the issue is “Flint and Beyond,” a special section on the Flint water crisis: Flint native Kelsey Ronan explores the effect on her family in “Blood and Water,” Tarfia Faizullah dedicates her poem “I Told the Water” to Flint, fiction by Matthew Baker, “Pheasants of Detroit,” and Jack Driscoll, “Calcheck and Priest” look at life in Michigan today.

Crab Fat Magazine Makes Changes

crab fat magazine logoCrab Fat Magazine, the online literary magazine featuring feminist/queer work with a flair for the experimental, has made a few changes lately. Instead of publishing quarterly PDF issues, Crab Fat will now publish monthly online HTML issues (with the past PDF issues still archived and available online). Issue 8, published May 22, is the introduction to this new format. An annual “best of” print anthology will also be produced with the 2015 edition set to release later this month.

Alaska Quarterly Review on Poems and Painting

peggy schumakerThe spring/summer 2016 issue of Alaska Quarterly Review includes the special feature “Sparks: A Conversation in Poems and Paintings” with Poet Peggy Shumaker [pictured] and Artist Kes Woodward.

From the Introduction: “This collaboration began when two friends decided to share an artistic conversation. Kes Woodward asked Peggy Shumaker to write a poem, and he created a painting in response to it. Peggy wrote in response, Kes painted in response, again and again. As each piece added its vividness to the conversation, both writer and artist found they were responding not just to the last piece, bu to the entire body of work. The work has taken many unpredictable and startling turns, adding to the intensity of this third art – an art that’s not language alone, not purely painting, but the bonding of the two.”

Uruguay Poet Idea Vilariño

vilarinoPoet Lore Spring/Summer 2016 features Jesse Lee Kercheval’s translation of Uruguay poet Idea Vilariño. In her introduction, Kercheval writes of Vilariño’s book-length work, Poem de amor, “her own Leave of Grass. . . stands as a testament to both the necessity and the impossibility of love in this world, especially for a passionate, independent woman determined to speak with her own voice.” Kercheval adds, “I believe it is important for English-speaking poets and poetry readers in general to have access to work, and am delighted to this selection of poems – in both Spanish and English – in Poet Lore. I hope all of Poemas de amor will soon be available in translation.” Several of the works are available in English on the Poet Lore website. A Guest begins:

You’re not mine
you’re not here
in my life
at my side
you don’t eat at my table
or laugh or sing
or live for me.

Chinua Achebe Symposium

massachusetts review spring 2016Chinua Achebe fans: You’re going to want the newest issue of The Massachusetts Review (v.LVII, n.1; Spring 2016) “A Gathering in Honor of Chinua Achebe” on the front cover doesn’t quite convey the powerhouse of essays included within. The editor’s note gives more specific context: “In our Spring issue the Massachusetts Review is honored to feature the contributions to a recent symposium held at the University of Massachusetts Amherst on October 14 and 15, 2015. ‘Forty Years After: Chinua Achebe and Africa in the Global Imagination’ was hosted by the university’s Interdisciplinary Studies Institute . . .” and included physician-executive Dr. Chidi Achebe (third son of Chinua and Christie Achebe), Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Ekwueme Michael Thelwell, Denja Abdullahi, Jule Chametzky, Caryl Phillips, Okey Ndibe, Chika Unigwe, Chuma Nwokolo, Maaza Mengiste, and Achille Mbembe. Each of their contributions are included in this issue along with the originating essay, “An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness” by Chinua Achebe.

Happy 10th Anniversary Ruminate

AWBAruminate 38The Spring 2016 issue of Rumninate Magazine celebrates ten years of publication! The volume features comments from readers, staff, and contributors who share their experience with “ruminating and contemplation – being still and attentive, pausing and listening.” The cover art, “Rhino” by Nicholas Price, actually appeared on the very first cover of Ruminate. Editor Brianna VanDyke says it is featured again as “a playful nod to our roots and the beautiful and gusty perserverances of a little arts magazine celebrating ten years.” And, in gratitude to their readership, tucked into each anniversary issue of Rhino is a gorgeous letterpress broadside which reads, “Always We Begin Again” – After St. Benedict. What a treat Ruminate has been for the past decade, and we all hope for many more to come!

Much to Recommend Georgia Review

georgia reviewI normally try to focus my blog notes on one “something” per lit mag per post, but the newest issue of The Georgia Review has several somethings worth note. First, congratulations to the Review for achieving 70 years of continuous quarterly publication! Congratulations to Emily Van Kley whose poem “Dear Skull” won the 2015 Loraine Williams Poetry Prize and is featured as the first work in the issue. Editor Stephen Corey’s “To Our Readers” takes a fun trouncing on the form when he declares: “I hearby announce the invention and likely demise of the ‘braided editorial,’ an offshoot from the ‘braided essay’ that has been rather de rigueur in recent years in some literary circles – to such an extent that people teach how-to classes, and anthologies of such works are probably imminent.” Also worth note: William Walsh’s interview with and inclusion of several poems by Rita Dove. And this among so much else to recommend.

Wallace Stevens Feature

new england reviewNew England Review v37 n1 includes a literary criticism section entitled The Mind at the End of the Palm: Wallace Stevens Thinking. In a series of five essays, “five poet-critics consider Wallace Stevens, with a focus on Stevens as a ‘philosophical’ poet (or not). The first four were presented as a symposium at the AWP Conference in 2014 [by David Baker, Linda Gregerson, Carl Phillips, Stanley Plumly], then gathered by David Baker and edited for print; the final essay, by Carol Frost, came to NER serendipitously, at about the same time. They all look closely at Stevens’s poetry and why it continues to engage us so deeply, more than a hundred years after he published his first poems.” Baker’s contribution can be read on the NER website here.

MĀNOA A Pacific Journal of International Writing

manoaMĀNOA publishes two volumes a year of contemporary writing, often the first time in translation, from throughout Asia, the Pacific, and the Americas. Past volumes have featured new work from such places as the People’s Republic of China, Tibet, Nepal, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Okinawa, Viet Nam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, Australia, Cambodia, French Polynesia, the Pacific Islands, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, as well as Canada, Mexico, and South America. The two most recent issues of MĀNOA are Story Is a Vagabond: Fiction, Essays, and Drama by Intizar Husain and The Colors of Dawn: Twentieth Centruy Korean Poetry. Husain, considered one of the greatest writers in Urdu, passed away at the beginning of the year in Lahore, Pakistan. His volume published just early in 2015 provides a fitting tribute to his impact on the literature of his culture.

Wallace Meets Whitman

wallace stevens journalThe newest issue of The Wallace Stevens Journal (a publication of the Wallace Stevens Society) is themed: Wallace Stevens and Walt Whitman. Society Vice President Glen Macleod writes in his introductory essay: “When I first proposed an MLA roundtable discussion on Walt Whitman and Wallace Stevens, it seemed like a natural pairing. . . A panel on this topic might prompt some fresh perspectives on a well-established case of literary influence. The topic turned out to be more interesting and more controversial than I anticipated.”

Macleod introduces each of the following essays, excerpts of which can be read on the publication’s Project Muse page:

“A Prefatory Note on Whitman, Stevens, and the Poetics of Americana” by Tyler Hoffman
“Between Surface and Influence: Stevens, Whitman, and the Problem of Mediation” by Patrick Redding
“Whitman and Stevens: No Supreme Fiction” by Matt Miller
“Beach Boys: Stevens, Whitman, and Franco-American Modernism” by Lee M. Jenkins
“Whitman and Stevens: Certain Phenomena of Sound” by Roger Gilbert
And a questionnaire – in which Macleod and Journal Editor Bart Eeckhout ask Tony Sharpe of Lancaster University questions about Whitman and Stevens in the United Kingdom.


World Literature Today International Comics Feature

world literature todayGuest edited by Bill Kartalopoulos, “International Comics” is the theme of the March-April 2016 issue of World Literature Today. Editor for the Best American Comics series, Kartalopoulos also teaches comics history and the graphic novel at Parsons The New School for Design and the School of Visual Arts. Along with his introduction, the magazine features an interview with artist David B. (B. is short for Beauchard), “Baby Boom (excerpts)” comics by Yūichi Yokoyama, and essays “Casting Shadows: Anke Feuchtenberger’s Comics and Graphic Narration” by Elizabeth Nijdam, “Frémok: Comics Out-of-Bounds” by Erwin Dejasse, “International Comics: Five Groundbreaking Publishers,” “Six Comic Books For Further Reading,”  and “Ilan Manouach: Defamiliarizing Comics” all by Bill Kartalopoulos.

The New Guard Literary BANG! Online

lyall harris bangBANG! is a monthly author online showcase published by The New Guard. Three pieces in any combination of previously unpublished poetry shorts or fiction or nonfiction are featured online for a month. Submission period runs all year round with the next installment planned for April 4, 2016. The March 2016 BANG! author is Lyall Harris. Past authors have included Alexandra Oliver, Mike Heppner, Marc Mewshaw, Timothy Dyke, Marcia Popp, Quenton Baker, Joshua Graber, Charles Wyatt, Julio Duggan, Jonathan Segol, Lissa Kiernan, Roger Bonair-Agard, James Kimbrell, Bridget Boland, E.G. Cunningham, Melissa Goode, Mark Wagstaff, Carla Stern, Sarah Glass, Jennifer Amell, Zakia R. Khwaja, Julie Poitras Santos and Amy Nash.

Editor-in-Chief Wanted Vine Leaves Literary Journal

vine leaves 2015Vine Leaves Literary Journal, featuring “the lost writing form of the vignette,” is accepting applications for Editor-in-Chief to manage the biannual print  and digital publication as well as develop a clear vision for its literary and financial stability. Qualifications include a creative self-starter with a minimum two years managerial and editorial experience; a voracious and diverse reader with extensive literary and design networks, excellent communications skills, and a relentless passion for supporting aspiring writers; ideally, an author yourself. This is a part-time, renewable, three-year contract, beginning late June 2016 reporting to Publisher Jessica Bell. This is a volunteer position until the Journal becomes profitable, when a reasonable salary will be negotiated. Applications close Friday, April 29, 2016 with Skype interviews late May/early June. Full posting here.

Arcadia on The New Chican@

ito romoArcadia 10.1 is themed “The New Chican@” with guest editor Ito Romo. The issue features short fiction by Luke Neftalí Villafranca, poetry by Octavio Quintanilla, fiction and nonfiction by Sarah Cortez, and a poem by Tim Z. Hernandezm, with original art from Vincent Valdez. Romo writes in his introduction, “I wanted to put together a group of artists who, with their art, be it visual or literary, tell a story honestly and beautifully – those were my only criteria. And so, I’ve chosen a group of Mexican American artists who have recreated for us, with images and words, the current strange and dark malaise of the invisible, of the forgotten.”

Rattle Feminist Poets Issue

rattle 51For Rattle #51, the editors put out the call for submissions from women poets with the same great uncertaintly every magazine risks when planning a themed issue or special feature. Rattle editors must have been pleased, as the issue features “a lengthy tribute to 31 feminist poets” selected from “the thousands of poems” submitted. Also included in the issue is a conversation with Maggie Nelson, author of The Argonauts. The feature explores the question, “What does it mean to be a feminist poet in the 21st century?” Rattle editors surmise: “There might be as many answers to that question as there are feminist poets—each of those featured provide their perspectives in an especially important contributor notes section.”

Featured poets: Lisa Baird, Michele Battiste, Roberta Beary, Heather Bell, Claire Blotter, Leila Chatti, Ann Clark, Barbara Crooker, Denise Duhamel & Maureen Seaton, Julie R. Enszer, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Beth Gylys, Kelsey Hagarman, Sandra Kohler, Amy Miller, Abby E. Murray, Jenny Qi, Jessy Randall, Laura Read, Lucinda Roy, Yaccaira Salvatierra, Amber Shockley, Robin Silbergleid, Julie Steiner, Lisa Summe, Katherine Barrett Swett, Kelly Grace Thomas, Amy Uyematsu, Julie Marie Wade, and Sara Watson.

Digital Forum: What is Well-Educated?

courtship windsThe inaugural issue of the revived Courtship of the Winds features a Digital Forum in which the editor asks five questions related to education reform, including “What does it mean to be well-educated?” and “Which educational systems in the U.S. or in other countries would you point to as a model for reform efforts here? What has made them successful?”

Editor William V. Ray engaged a variety of professionals in the conversation, and while based in Massachusetts, the topic is pertinent nation wide. Participants include: Rachael Avery Barton, Middle School History Teacher; Michael Capuano, U.S. Representative for Massachusetts’ 7th District; Kenneth Hawes, Senior Lecturer in Education, Wellesley College; Phillip James, History Department Coordinator, Lincoln-Sudbury R.H.S.; Véronique Latimer, High School Art Teacher; Arthur Unobskey, Assistant Superintendent, Gloucester Public Schools; Isa Zimmerman, Executive Director, Massachusetts Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

The Courtship of Winds publishes two online issues per year of poetry, fiction, short dramatic pieces, essays, photography, art, and short pieces of music.

Brevity January 2016 Craft Essays

Brevity online magazine of the “extremely brief essay form” also regularly features craft essays. Issue 51 (January 2016) offers a number of these to satisfy a variety of writers’ interests:

“Textures and Contrasts: Starting Points for Travel Writing” by Sheila Madary
“On Asking the Hard Questions” by Silas Hansen
“Becoming a Writer in Due Time” by Chelsey Drysdale
“On Keeping a (Writing) Notebook (or Three)” by Randon Billings Noble

Read these and the newest in brief nonfiction at Brevity.

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

tishman review 2 1The Tishman Review quarterly is available online as a PDF, but it’s also wonderful to hold this full-size, 8.5 x 11 perfect bound print copy. The pages provide generous space for art and poetry, with prose cut to two columns for easier reading. The gorgeous cover art Of Skin and Earth by Stephen Linsteadt in just the invitation readers need to continue on inside.

new madrid 2016The theme for New Madrid Winter 2016  is “Evolving Islands” and features a selection of essays, poetry, and fiction in response to this theme. The cover art is courtesy of NASA, “Eluthera Island, Bahamas, 2002.”

creative nonfictionIn keeping with Creative Nonfiction‘s theme “Let’s Talk About the Weather,” this cover image comes from artist and designer Mark Nystrom‘s “wind drawings” series. Driven by the weather, this series is a drawing process Nystrom developed using weather instruments and custom electronics that collect wind data that is then digitally interpreted. Nystrom’s images accompany each essay in this issue of CNF.

Verse Dedicated to the Portfolio

verseSince 2009, Verse has been dedicated to publishing a collection of works from each selected contributor. Readers who enjoy spending more time with one author will appreciate this format; the most recent issue offers nearly 450 pages to only 14 portfolios by Natalie Eilbert, Sandra Simonds, Timothy Liu, Eric Pankey, Karla Kelsey, Leonard Schwartz, Kate Colby, John High, Kathryn Cowles, Douglas Piccinnini, Laressa Dickey, B.J. Soloy, Aleah Sterman Goldin, and Kevin Varrone. Verse is housed in the English Department at the University of Richmond, with Faculty Editor Brian Henry’s ENG 393 students involved in the editorial process.

Prism Review 2016 Poetry & Fiction Contest Winners

michaelolinhittPrism Review announced the winners of its 2016 poetry and short story awards, as chosen by Victoria Chang (poetry) and Bryan Hurt (fiction).

Fiction: “Messiah Complex,” Michael Olin-Hitt [pictured]. Judge Bryan Hurt writes, “I was drawn into the story by Josh’s kinetic voice and hooked by his spirited and smart digressions. The author carefully and subtly adds so many layers: there’s sadness and loss but it’s met with optimism and empathy.

Poetry: “Slow Motion Landscape,” Sam Gilpin. Judge Victoria Chang writes, “here, grass is ‘guillotines,’ speech ‘wrens us in its folding,’ and sunsets ‘thrum.’ The language is fresh and new in this sequence poem, but even more interesting is the mind behind the poem–one that both thinks and sees abstractions and paradoxes that make the reader read and re-read, think and re-think, see and see again.”

The winners’ works will be included in the 2016 issue, available in June at the Prism Review website.

Gettysburg Review Seeks New Managing Editor

The Gettysburg Review has announced that managing editor Ellen Hathaway has moved on to retirement, which means there is an opening for a new manging editor at the literary magazine.

Applicants should have 1-3 years of experience as an editor/copyeditor with at least a BA degree. The deadline for application is February 19, 2016, so check out the job posting here, and good luck!

2015 NSK Neustadt Prize Winner

world literature todayWorld Literature Today January/February 2016 features a celebration of the NSK Neustadt Prize Laureate Meshack Asare. Since 2003, the NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature has been awarded every other year to a living writer or author-illustrator with significant achievement in children’s or young-adult literature. Laureates receive a check for $25,000, a silver medallion, and a certificate at a public ceremony at the University of Oklahoma and are featured in a subsequent issue of World Literature Today. Other recipients of the NSK Prize have included Mildred D. Taylor (2003), Brian Doyle (2005), Katherine Paterson (2007), Vera B. Williams (2009), Virginia Euwer Wolff (2011), and Naomi Shihab Nye (2013). [Text from the NSK Neustadt Prize website.]

2015 BrainStorm Poetry Contest Honorable Mentions

open minds quarterly

Open Minds Quarterly is a publication of “poetry and literature of mental health recovery.” The winners of their annual BrainStorm Poetry Contest for mental health consumers is divided over two publications. The first, second, and third-place poems are published in the spring issue, with honorable mentions following in the fall issue. The Honorable Mentions are “The Rain King” by Thomas Leduc, “Ophelia” by Ruthie-Marie Beckwith, “Observational” by Katy Richey, and “The 4th Floor” by Katy Richey.

Craft Essays :: GT Feb Bulletin

Glimmer Train Bulletins are a free monthly resource with “essays by creative-writing teachers and other accomplished authors on craft, perspective, and the particulars of writing and getting published.” I enjoy reading these brief but poignant commentaries on the writing life. Here’s the lead lines for February’s Bulletin #109 – see for yourself if you aren’t intrigued to read at least one of these:

stephanie soileauGabe Herron: You have to forget time because it’s going to take how long it takes, not one minute longer, not one minute less.
Carrie Brown: I’m interested in how shockingly difficult it is to be good. And I’m interested in our failures in that regard—exactly how we fail and why, how we console ourselves and others, how we forgive ourselves and others, how we fail to forgive.
Stephanie Soileau [pictured]: I believe in storytelling as a way to map and explore the ambiguities of human experience, and it is this belief that motivates me as a fiction writer. Stories have given me a language to express the contradictions in my own experience, and because…
George Rabasa: The fragrant mess is being constantly stirred, the recipe changing, if not hour by hour, certainly from one week to the next: memory agitates, imagination warps, new stuff is learned and enters the mixture.

WLT Celebrates 90 with New Series

daniel simonWorld Literature Today celebrates 90 years of continuous publication with its January/February 2016 issue. Editor Daniel Simon [pictured] writes: “To celebrate. . . I’m pleased to announce the 2016 Puterbaugh Essay Series, a yearlong suite of review-essays that survey the twenty-first-century literary landscape. The editors have invited five writers to reflect on the contemporary scene by choosing a book or group of books, published since 2010, that have inspired their own creative and critical thinking. Bangladeshi novelist and critic K. Anis Ahmed launches the series with “Fiction: A Transgressive Art,” a compelling essay that, among other topics, focuses on the insidious forms of censorship that contemporary writers tend to internalize. Subsequent issues will include essays by Ghassan Zaqtan (Palestine), Bernice Chauly (Malaysia), Dubravka Ugrešić (former Yugoslavia), and Porochista Khakpour (Iran/US).” A good reason to start a subscription to WLT today!

New Lit on the Block :: The 3288 Review

michigan logoMichigan-based The 3288 Review is a new print and ebook quarterly publishing short fiction, nonfiction (essays and creative non-fiction), poetry of all forms and formats, reviews, photography, and artwork, with an ongoing interview series on their website.

What’s with 3288? Purely a Michigan thing, as Editor-in-Chief John Winkelman tells me: “We wanted a name which reflected something about Michigan. Based on a survey done in 2000, Michigan has a total of 3,288 miles of coastline (including islands). However, with the rise in water levels over recent years, we may need to revisit this.”

A project of Caffeinated Press, established in 2014 as an independent publisher serving the authors and readers of the West Michigan community, The 3288 Review is dedicated to finding and showcasing literary and artistic talent with a particular focus on West Michigan. Winkelman explains the publication’s philosophy, “Literary journals provide a good point of entry for new writers, and can be more narrowly focused than can publishing companies as a whole. We feel that West Michigan talent is under-represented in the larger literary world, and we want to do something about that.”

Working alongside the editor-in-chief are Jason Gillikin (fiction editor), Elyse Wild (nonfiction editor), and Leigh Jajuga (poetry editor) who read all submissions blind, providing input and feedback. Accepted submissions are then “curated” for individual issues.

The 3288 Review readers can expect to find finely crafted arts and letters, with that particular focus on talent from West Michigan. Some recent contributors include Lisa Gundry, Jennifer Clark, Mary Buchinger, Z.G. Tomaszewski, Robert Knox, J.M. Leija, Elyse Wild, and Matthew Olson-Roy. The 3288 Review also just nominated two of their published writers for the Pushcart Prize: J.M. Leija, for her essay “Tacet” from issue 1.1, and Matthew Olson-Roy, for his short story “Our Monstrous Family” from issue 1.2.

Winkelman tells me that future plans for 2016 include a broader scope to include regional journalism and long-form interviews.

Submissions are accepted through the publication’s website on a rolling basis with deadlines for inclusion in each issue – roughly a month before the publication date.

Lit Mag Covers :: Picks of the Week

2beloit poetry journalThe Winter 2015/2016 cover of Beloit Poetry Journal features Alexis Lago’s “Tree of Indulgences,” watercolor on paper, 2009. Lago is a Cuban visual artist now living and working between Toronto and Florida. See more of his works here: www.alexislago.weebly.com.
massachusetts reviewThe Massachusetts Review Winter 2015 includes two outstanding art features: Selections from Chuck Close Photographs which were on exhibit Sept. – Dec. 2015 at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Museum of Contemporary Art and Selections from Women’s Work: Feminist Art from the Smith College Museum Art Collection which were on exhibit Sept. 2015 – Jan. 2016. The cover features Bill T. Jones (2008) by Chuck Close.
writing disorder2It would appear that human faces have captured my attention for this week’s picks. The Writing Disorder online lit mag features the illustrative art Alina Zamanova on its homepage as well as with a selection of her works in this quarter’s issue.

2015 Guy Owen Poetry Award Winner

southern poetry reviewSouthern Poetry Review 53:2 features the winner of the 2015 Guy Own Poetry Award. Philip Dacey was the final judge, selecting Ron Watson’s “View from Where the Grass Is Always Greener.” In addition to publication, the Guy Owen Award winner receives $1000. Other poets featured in the issue include Charles Atkinson, Anna Lena Phillips Bell, Jody Bolz, Beverly Burch, John Crutchfield, Caroline DuBois, Heather Hamilton, Gordon Johnston, Lynne Knight, Nick McRae, James Najarian, Daniel Joseph Polikoff, J. Stephen Rhodes, Maura Stanton, Ed Taylor, Will Walker, and Charles Harper Web.

IR Undergrad Lit Mag Online

IR Online Issue 1Issue 1 of Indiana Review Online: An Undergraduate Project is now available. The editors write that IRO was started “to give voice to writers we don’t often see in literary journals. In the hyper-competitive world of literary publishing, emerging, undergraduate writers do not always have the opportunity to gain their first footholds. We wanted to help change that.” And indeed they have, receiving hundreds of submission from around the world, the first issue was whittled down to top picks in poetry and fiction. Featured writers include Amzie Augusta Dunekacke, Ellen Goff, Katie Harrs, Robert Julius, Tiwaladeoluwa Adekunle, W. S. Brewbaker, John M. Brown, Isabella Escalante, Kacey Fang, Shyanne Marquette, Carly Jo Olszewski, Meritt Rey Salathe, and Sage Yockelson.

Glimmer Train Short Story for New Writers Winners

gabe herronGlimmer Train has just chosen the winning stories for their November Short Story Award for New Writers. This competition is held three times a year and is open to all writers whose fiction has not appeared in a print publication with a circulation greater than 5000. The next Short Story Award competition is open now: Short Story Award for New Writers. Glimmer Train’s monthly submission calendar may be viewed here.

1st place goes to Gabe Herron [pictured] of Scappoose, OR, who wins $1500 for “Suzette.” His story will be published in Issue 99 of Glimmer Train Stories.

2nd place goes to Sam Miller Khaikin of Brooklyn, NY. She wins $500 for “A Working Theory of Stellar Collapse.”

3rd place goes to Cady Vishniac of Columbus, OH. She wins $300 for “Move.”

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

Kenyon Review Short Fiction Winners

shasta grantThe newest issue of Kenyon Review features the winners of their eighth annual Short Fiction Contest:

First Prize: Shasta Grant [pictured], “Most Likely To”
Runner-up: Rob Howell, “Mars or Elsewhere”
Runner-up: Courtney Sender, “Black Harness”

Judge Ann Patchett writes:

In “Most Likely To,” Shasta Grant delivers a full narrative arc in four pages. Her characters experienced loss and were changed by it, a pretty remarkable feat to pull off in such a small space. Perfectly chosen details made both the characters and the setting memorable. This was the story that stayed with me.

Robert Howell gives us a completely delightful flight of imagination in “Mars or Elsewhere”. In dealing with a lover’s fantasy of what could happen were the couple to run off together, he creates a wild and atmospheric riff on possibility that read like jazz.

Courtney Sender matches the light topic of youthful lost love with the extreme heft of the Holocaust in “Black Harness” and comes up with a miraculous balance between the personal and the universal. I never could have imagined where this story was going and I was pleased by the surprise.

The winner and runners-up can also be read online here.

Baltimore Review Winter 2016 Contest Winners

baltimore review contest blog postBaltimore Review announces the winners of the Baltimore Review Winter 2016 Contest. The theme for this contest was “Health,” and the final judge was Joanna Pearson, MD.

First Place
Heidi Czerwiec, “Nervous Systems”

Second Place
Christine Stewart-Nuñez, “Art of the Body”

Third Place
Raquel Fontanilla, “Souvenir from Where You’ve Been”

Work by the winners is included in the Winter 2016 issue, available at the Baltimore Review website, and submissions for the journal re-open February 1.

Wallace Stevens and Cognitive Poetics

The Fall 2015 (v39 n2) of The Wallace Stevens Journal is a special issue: “Stevens and the Cognitive Turn in Literary Studies” edited, with an introduction, by Natalie Gerber and Nicholas Myklebust. In addition to original poetry and reviews by contributors, the journal provides excerpts of each of the following essays on its website:

  • “Bergamo on a Postcard”; or, A Critical History of Cognitive Poetics by Nicholas Myklebust
  • Aesthetics and Impossible Embodiment: Stevens, Imagery, and Disorientation by G. Gabrielle Starr
  • A Mirror on the Mind: Stevens, Chiasmus, and Autism Spectrum Disorder by Mark J. Bruhn
  • “The Eye’s Plain Version”: Visual Anatomy and Theories of Perception in Stevens by Deric Corlew
  • Acoustic Confusion and Medleyed Sound: Stevens’ Recurrent Pairings by Roi Tartakovsky

Publishing since 1977, The Wallace Stevens Journal is devoted to all aspects of the poetry and life of American modernist poet Wallace Stevens through scholarly articles, poems, book reviews, news, and bibliographies.

Four Poets on Teaching Writing

hampden sydney poetry reviewIn every issue, The Hampden-Sydney Poetry Review includes “4×4” – four of the issue’s contributors answering the same four questions. The winter 2015 issue (#41) features Lesley Wheeler, Linwood Rumney, Chris Dombrowski, and Marianne Boruch. The questions all focus on teaching poetry:

1) Can poetry be taught?
2) Is there any value to students having a foundation in traditional prosody (meter, rhyme, fixed form, what have you)? Or should free-verse be the starting place? Or something else?
3) What poets have been the most useful to you in your teaching endeavors and why?
4) [After a “summary of a boilerplate class”] Can you imagine a radical revision of the way we teach poetry in the creative writing classroom? What would it look like? No workshop? No teacher? What more, or better, could we do?

Great questions with thoughtful and thought-provoking answers – which you have to get the issue to read – but also some great conversation starters for the teachers among us. How would you answer these?