Hark! The Herald Lit Mags Sing!
Bookforum closing; Astra Magazine closing; Words Without Borders wins Whiting Foundation grant; new noir mag Dark Yonder; job opportunities; 100+ places to publish, and more
Welcome to the bi-weekly news roundup!
Greetings Lit Magistrate,
This just in: Bookforum, which has been publishing essays, reviews, criticism and interviews since 1994, has announced its closing.
While this doesn’t relate to lit mags, per se, the news comes on the heels of another premier publication, Astra Magazine, announcing its closing.
As Publishers Weekly reports, “[Bookforum’s] closure comes just two weeks after the abrupt shuttering of…Astra literary magazine. For many in the literary community, the end of Bookforum is the second and even more devastating blow in a double-whammy that does not bode well for the literary culture or industry. Replying to the magazine's Twitter announcement, an outpouring of authors and other publishing professionals expressed their disappointment. Small press Semiotext(e) replied: ‘We might as well fold too.’"
Interestingly, both magazines were tied to corporate behemoths. Penske Media Company purchased Bookforum last week, making PMC “the sole owner of all three of the art world’s leading print magazines after purchasing Art in America and ARTnews in 2018.” PMC “also owns Billboard, Rolling Stone and entertainment trade publications Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter as well as IndieWIRE. The Penske umbrella includes over 20 media brands total.”
As for Astra, while it was a project of Astra Publishing House, the parent company of the publishing house is Thinkingdom Media Group, which is based in Beijing. It’s suspiciously tough to find information about this company, other than what’s on their website. According to one former employee:
On a brighter note, Words Without Borders has announced that it’s a grant from the prestigious Whiting Foundation.
“The Whiting Foundation’s support will help WWB build capacity to deliver services to a growing community of educators, students, and schools in the United States. The grant will help fund new outreach efforts and program staff as WWB expands partnerships with school districts and schools across the country. Providing $75,000 in the first year of funding, the Whiting Foundation’s grant is the largest received by WWB in its nearly twenty-year history.”
Words Without Borders is also presently hiring for a handful of positions.
And new lit mag Dark Yonder, dedicated to noir, got some recent press:
“According to [Editor Eryk] Pruitt, Dark Yonder is looking for a genre of stories called ‘neo-noir.’ Pruitt explained: ‘When you talk about noir stories and hardboiled stories, I think a certain image comes to a lot of people’s minds and I think that image is very outdated, very 50s and 60s—you know like a drunk, alcoholic man, going around doing manly things. We’re not looking for that. We’re looking for something that is going to help shepherd us into the new age, where it’s not all just broken-man centered.’”
As for opportunities to house your latest and greatest, here’s what’s out there:
Erika Dreifus’s latest newsletter lists over 60 calls for submissions.
Erica Verillo’s got 15 Literary Magazines Open NOW - SFF, Horror, Essays, Poetry, Genre Fiction, and more - Paying markets.
International Writers Collective has a few interesting listings.
Authors Publish has 22 Approachable Literary Journals; Writing Opportunities for December 2022; and 49 Themed Submissions Calls and Contests for December 2022.
As for us, there is a Submissions Study Hall coming up at the end of this week. Also, I’ll be chatting with Indiana Review Editor Barnardo Wade next week. Learn more and register here.
Also…guess what! I’ve added an additional event to this month’s line-up. On Thursday, December 15th at 2pm est I’ll be speaking with Jenn Sheck-Kahn, Founder of Journal of the Month.
Jenn and I chatted last year and we promised to do a follow-up, as it was such fun. In this session, Jenn says, “We will be talking about literary magazines, why editors say you should read a recent issue before submitting your work to them, and what the submission guidelines don't tell you. Jenn will divulge how she discerns a journal's “house style.”
We will also take your lit mag questions. Join us!
This is free, open to all, and will be recorded for viewing if you can’t make it.
And that you drifters through department stores in search of your dream gift for your lucky dreamy significant somebodies, you scrollers through the vast and voracious shopping centers of cyberspace desperate for a perfect chunk of cufflinks—do people still wear those?, you on the prowl for that pristine pair of flannel-print pajamas, you with gift cards up the wazoo and wrapping paper winding round you like shimmery winter wings, you who wonders what to give that cousin who already has everything and, more to the point, really, how to go out spending when so many are out there having nothing, you who make some attempt, this day, in any which way, to find something that might mean something from your most idiosyncratic private shelf of self-curiosities and you who know, very deep down, like, truly know, that though it’s corny, so very eye-rollingly hokey, really, a cliche, my god, such a cliche, but still, maybe, nonetheless true? yes, you and you, everywhere, who know that, yes, the very best present of all, sometimes, is simply your presence—here, and here, and here.
Have a most glorious week, pals.
Fondly,
Becky
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Oh this was a good one Becky! I wondered if I was the only person floored by what happened with Bookforum... but hey! I got a long story coming out in the January Dark Yonder! Let's hear it for neo-neo noir!!