Don't Go Breaking My Lit Mag!
Barnard gets backlash; call for censorship-themed works; contest entries to train AI; un-Buellers; Buellers; work opportunities; new database for Medium submissions; markets & more
Welcome to our bi-weekly news roundup!
Greetings Lit Maglectorate,
Barnard College has come under fire for its social media posts about a student who interned at a lit mag, and under fire again for its deletion of those posts.
The posts pertained to an article by class of ‘25 student Layla Faraj, who interned with ArabLit Quarterly. For the college’s website, Faraj wrote:
This summer — with the help of Beyond Barnard — I have dedicated my time to expanding my relationship to Arabic translation at ArabLit Quarterly. From writing book reviews of newly translated literature and curating excerpts for the magazine’s website to conducting interviews in both English and Arabic, I have had the opportunity to work closely with literary works that matter to me. It has been endlessly rewarding to spend my time speaking to people who are thinking about language with the same curiosity and fervor that I have.
ArabLit Quarterly’s spring 2024 issue is themed “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!” and is a collaboration with Majalla 28. According to the site, “Co-editors Mohammed Zaqzooq and Mahmoud Al-Shaer have collected essays, poems, and life-and-death reflections by writers living in Gaza that speak to their lives between October 2023 and March 2024.”
Once Barnard posted on social media about the article, which featured the magazine’s most recent cover, X users expressed outrage and accused it of “uplifting a ‘literary’ journal which praises Hamas members.”
In response to the criticism, Barnard removed all social media posts about the article.
Now, they are facing even more backlash as the removal of their posts is being called “cowardly and embarrassing,” and disgustingly spineless.”
For its part, ArabLit Quarterly has kept up its post linking to the Barnard site and Faraj’s work with the magazine.
In quasi-related news, the online magazine Full Bleed is seeking works on the subject of censorship. I don’t typically share individual calls for submissions as there are too many to keep up with (and others, such as those below, do that job so well). But this call crossed my path and it’s relevant to much of what we’ve discussed here at Lit Mag News.
From Full Bleed’s site:
We are also eager to receive submissions of visual art, criticism, literary prose, art and design history, reportage, and poetry considering acts of censorship, or that address censorship as a phenomenon in our time or times past, here in the U.S. or in other parts of the world. Additionally, we welcome narratives from the “front line,” so to speak. If you have been fired or punished for expressing your views or have had creative works, exhibitions, or acts censored, retracted, redacted, canceled, demonized, or deplatformed in some way, we encourage you to send us your work, or evidence of it, for consideration for inclusion in the issue along with a description of any related controversy and its consequences.
Submissions are open until November 15th.
And, while I also generally don’t single out individual contests, a reader shared The Fabel World Short Story Competition and it looks…interesting? From their site:
The Fabel World Short Story Competition is a contest with a difference: there’s no brief. Rather than encourage you to write new short stories, it’s designed to help you breathe life into your back catalogue. What's more, it carries one of the largest and deepest short story prize pools in the English Language.
Indeed, the First Place prize is AU $16,000.
Now, what’s different about this prize? It’s judged by readers, for one thing. “In the first round, the competition will be judged by readers who we will be recruiting as judges. These readers will score entries, and the 50 top-rated entries will form the longlist.”
But also (emphasis mine):
While we don’t ask for exclusivity, a condition of your entry is that you allow all your submissions to be published on the Fabel platform for a minimum of 12 months. During that period, you can also submit or publish your work elsewhere.
Fabel is developing an AI-driven search criteria to make stories easy to find. We will be using these entries to help us train AI to create this search functionality. We commit that no works will be used to train AI to create its own content.
All submissions used for AI training to develop their search functionality? I don’t know what to make of this. I am making no claims about the greatness or non-greatness of this contest. I’ll just share and leave it for you smart people to interpret.
In uplifting news, I’ve received word that two lit mags labeled recently as “Buellers” have arisen or might soon arise out of Buellerdom!
Small Orange Journal, which was mentioned as a possible Bueller recently, has informed me that they are active. Their newest issue has just gone live.
The Southampton Review will also be (hopefully) coming back into the fray soon. A reader wrote to me: “There was a change in leadership there. All went to hell. The previous leadership is back at the helm. For now I think it qualifies as a Bueller, but maybe we can keep an eye out.”
Speaking of Buellers, it’s time to dive in! For those unfamiliar, this is the section of the newsletter where we ask out loud about those magazines that seem to have gone quietly missing. No new issues for a while, no social media presence, no response to queries, leaving us all to wonder…
This week we’re looking at:
Open Minds Quarterly. A writer inquired about this magazine. From what I see: last X post in 2023; no website updates for a year. Duotrope lists as “does not qualify” for a listing.
Propertius Press. I’m not sure if this qualifies as a “Bueller,” as technically it’s still running. But still worth sharing:
Persephone’s Fruit. Writer reports having work accepted last January, then multiple delays and no clear answer about publication timeframe.
And, a writer shared with me frustrations that work accepted at Cimarron Review has been sitting unpublished for over 18 months. Though the editor has been in contact with the writer and made assurances of publication, there has been no change. The magazine’s issues have not been updated on the site since 2022. Duotrope lists this market as “does not qualify.”
Got any insight into these journals? Got a Bueller of your own? Please share.
For those of you looking to get more involved in the stirring up of hot and spicy lit mag sauce:
Another Chicago Magazine seeks a Managing Editor.
HerStry seeks readers.
The Common seeks readers.
For those of you looking for new markets:
The indefatigable folks at Chill Subs have created (yet again!) something spectacular:
Should you publish fiction on Medium? What about on Substack? Ah, great questions that we will investigate another day. In the meantime, check out their database. (And buy them a coffee because they obviously never sleep!)
Erika Dreifus has posted “45+ fee-free opportunities that pay for winning/published work.”
Erica Verrillo has 73 Calls for Submissions in August 2024 - Paying markets and 36 Writing Contests in August 2024 - No entry fees.
Authors Publish has 28 Literary Journals Focused on Limited Demographics; Five Paying Literary Magazines to Submit to in August 2024 and 31 Themed Submission Calls and Contests for August 2024.
As for us, still lots of stuff happening this month! You can find information about all of our fun events here:
For those who’ve registered for the Q & A with Shenendoah Editors, please note that Editor DW McKinney is unable to attend, so in addition to EIC Beth Staples we will now be joined by Editorial Fellow Mubanga Kalimamukwento.
Also, I’m still finalizing the roster for the 2024-2025 Lit Mag Reading Club. I can already share good news that in addition to Alaska Quarterly Review, we will be featuring Sewanee Review, Massachusetts Review, Copper Nickel, and The Pinch. More info soon! You can learn all about The Lit Mag Reading Club here:
And that you answer seekers and explanation needers, you truth pursuers and no-stone-left-uncoverers, you with your head burrowed deep into the earth’s pockets that take you down down down and you hitching your wagon on a question mark that sends you swinging sideways over every sea, you with wonder in eyes and want in your heart, you who are cats unfazed by curiosity as well as curiosity’s close cousin, thirst, you knowledge hunters, you wisdom worshippers, you on searches that have taken you into the deep belly of dangerous distant moons and you who’ve nobly and valiantly shown up at the desk in order to tell the tale, you and you, journeying through the jubilant jungle of uncertainty, chancing the unchartered chambers of ever-changing charbroiled choreography, you with your starry lashes blinking and your hearts as big as all the world’s most welcoming pineapples, is the news in literary magazines.
Have a most wonderful week, pals.
Fondly,
Becky
My AQR came in the mail today - getting a new lit mag always feels like a little Christmas.
Hi Becky! In the previous Bueller issue, you mentioned that you would be reaching out to the Editor of the Fairy Tale Review. I wonder whether you received a response (but am guessing that you probably didn’t.) I emailed the Journals Manager at Wayne State U. Press to ask whether there would be an issue this year, but have received no response there either.