Imagine all the Lit Mags!
Gabriel Garcia Marquez gets a rejection letter; ongoing efforts to save Gettysburg Review; future of lit mags; new AI journal; lit mag swag; AWP awards; volunteer opportunities, markets + more
Welcome to our bi-weekly news roundup!
Greetings Lit Magnificents,
Well, this is not newsworthy, but a friend shared it online and I thought you all might get a kick out of it. (Click on the image to enlarge.)
Never let rejections get you down! You just don’t know what’s coming around the corner. Indeed, one year after receiving this rejection letter, Marquez won The Nobel Prize.
Now, onto the news!
The fight to save Gettysburg Review continues. Hugh J. Martin, Professor of English and Editor of War, Literature and the Arts, has written A Letter in Support of the Gettysburg Review. Says Martin,
As a professor at the United States Air Force Academy, when I teach cadets literature and writing, it’s tragic that I will no longer be able to point them to The Gettysburg Review as a place to go for art, inspiration, dialogue, a place to find and experience voices, new and old….Often, at American writing conferences and readings and literary events, someone will casually mention, I read Gettysburg or Submit to Gettysburg or I love Gettysburg. They’re not talking, of course, about the town or the college. And eventually, if this decision stands, no one will have any idea what they’re talking about.
Thalia Hubbard has created a petition to save the magazine. Says Hubbard,
Every year tuition goes up, and somehow the college has enough money to build and remodel parts of campus, but not enough to protect the magazine that is so important to Gettysburg College?
This cannot be allowed. The Gettysburg Review cannot be closed!!
In The College Administration Addresses Budgetary Constraints, The Gettysburghian Editor Laken Franchetti reports on a meeting with Gettysburg College President Bob Iuliano and Chief Communications and Marketing Officer Jamie Yates.
Sadly, judging by the President’s responses to questions, it appears the decision to close this magazine is final.
The Gettysburgian then informed Iuliano and Yates that the Review has had numerous offers of purchase and offers to begin fundraising campaigns. Iuliano and Yates were questioned as to if the administration would consider any of these avenues rather than ending the publication.
“The Review has been around for 35 years. These issues are not new over the course of the 35 years. We have not seen a number of folks coming forward to ultimately create the sort of endowment that would allow the Gettysburg review to turn with a greater degree of financial independence,” Iuliano said. “It would take more than four million dollars, probably closer to five, to endow the Gettysburg Review. I have not heard any suggestion that that is possible given the 35 years that it has been in existence.”
Inside Higher Ed reports that in addition to losing the magazine, professors now also fear the loss of jobs at Gettysburg College. In Tenured Faculty Raises Alarm as Gettysburg Eyes Fewer Adjuncts, Ryan Quinn Reports,
Bob Iuliano, president of the Pennsylvania liberal arts college, told Inside Higher Ed earlier this month that The Gettysburg Review’s funding may be shifted to more directly support students, saying the magazine’s purpose wasn’t “the education of students.” He said the closing of The Gettysburg Review was part of a larger strategic change focused on students’ experiences and outcomes.
Multiple faculty members are worried about a particular tactical shift: they say college officials have indicated that they’re planning to reduce, and possibly eliminate, adjunct and visiting assistant professor positions, which might increase remaining faculty members’ teaching responsibilities. They also say the college is planning for a smaller student body composed of admittees who are less reliant on financial aid.
On his ‘stack, Paul Zakrzewski has taken a close look at what the closure of Gettysburg Review means for lit mags at large. He argues that “…lit journals need to think about creating and fostering a creative community around them” and that they “may have to learn to move beyond their print editions if they want to connect with new readers today.”
At The Guardian, Amy Mae Baxter has also written about the struggling state of lit mags. This editor has no intention to ever give up on print publishing. Baxter writes,
Well-meaning people are always keen to suggest ideas about how to fund the magazine. More subscription content! Who’s going to write it? I have a full-time job. Take on more advertising! Who wants to read a literary magazine that’s full of ads? And why not just cancel the print issue?, which always makes me sad.
Print editions of literary magazines are important. For unpublished, radical writers, they can be life-changing. They give weight to voices that are all too often ignored by the mainstream publishing industry…As long as I can, I’ll be printing issues of Bad Form, filled with words by writers of colour. Let’s just hope there will be people who can afford to buy them.
Also at The Guardian, and on a less serious note (though I do understand that some people take fashion very seriously), Alaina Demopoulos has written about literary swag and “the rise of litcore.” She writes,
[A]ll this arts apparel can be traced back to 2014, when the New Yorker released its first tote bag. It quickly became a ubiquitous, commute-friendly item, one hashtagged and shown off in liberal cities…
Since then, the Drift, a scrappy startup lit mag, has taken over as the official tote bag for Gen Z’s thinking person.
Demopoulos’s article got me thinking: Maybe it’s time for Lit Mag News to get in on the lit mag swag!
But back to serious stuff. John Freeman has announced that his journal, Freeman’s, will also be shuttering. Anita Felicelli writes,
In 2015, after leaving his role as editor of Granta, [Freeman] debuted the preeminent literary magazine Freeman’s, which he edited over the past near decade. If you’re prospecting for literary treasure, there’s no better place to start your search than journals and magazines—these compilations are the mighty undersung heroes of culture, introducing authors and works that readers might otherwise miss, sometimes arranging them so that the pieces speak to one another.
This fall, Freeman’s 10-issue run closes with Conclusions, full of striking essays, stories, short shorts, and poems that circle the titular theme in unusual and rich ways.
And a brand new lit mag caught my eye today, which may interest those of you watching with fascination (and terror) as AI enters the literary sphere. Postqualia is “dedicated to showcasing the ever-evolving landscape of literature created by Artificial Intelligence….Our journal…seeks to highlight the potential of AI in the realm of creativity, and to explore the implications of this new form of expression.” The editors state, “In your submission, include details about the AI software you employed and the prompts that ignited the creative spark. Share insights into your writing process, highlighting how the collaboration between AI and your creative mind unfolded.”
In other news, ‘tis the season to nominate! AWP is now accepting letters of nomination for its Small Press Publisher Award. This “award acknowledges the hard work, creativity, and innovation of these presses and journals, and honors their contributions to the literary landscape through their publication of consistently excellent work.” Nomination deadline is October 27th.
They are also accepting nominations for the George Garrett Award. This award “for Outstanding Community Service in Literature…recognizes a few of those individuals who have made notable donations of care, time, labor, and money to support writers and their literary accomplishments.”
Might you know someone who has offered their care, time and labor in order to support writers? Anyone? Anyone at all? Think hard! Nomination deadline is October 31st.
On to jobs and work opportunities in the sexy, saucy and salacious landscape of lit mag publishing. Here’s what’s out there:
TriQuarterly seeks poetry readers.
Kitchen Table Quarterly seeks a Social Media Editor.
For those of you looking for cozy homes for your latest & greatest:
The Sub Club newsletter has posted 89 Poetry Magazines That Pay $50+.
Authors Publish has posted 24 Respected Literary Journal and Opportunities for Historically Underrepresented Writers this October.
If you’d like to find even more markets for your writing, or you have a zillion questions and don’t know where to turn, I’ll be teaching a Craft Talk on November 15th. Click the banner to learn more.
As for us, I hope those of you in the Lit Mag Reading Club have been enjoying your copy of Ecotone! I certainly have, though I admit I’m a bit behind in my reading. No worries, though. I share this so you’ll all know it’s perfectly fine. Do what you can and don’t stress and join the conversations in whatever capacity you’re able!
I will also be speaking with Spoon River Poetry Review Editor Steve Halle tomorrow (Tuesday) at 12pm est.
In case you missed it, the registration links for all discussions are here.
Looking ahead to next month, our November lit mag will be Missouri Review. I’ll post more information about ordering this journal as soon as possible.
As a reminder: our Lit Mag Reading Club is open to all, and you can join anytime. More details are here.
And that you abundant archways bending over backwards, forwards and all-ways-wards in order to keep the ground beneath you level and cool, you radiant suns ray-stretching across the infinite expanse of horizons unknown, you with arms a million miles long, you with a hundred hearts both hungry and full, you whose load is heavy, you whose pile is very high indeed, you out there caring, caring hard in fact, with thoughts turned worryward and mindscapes a flurry of fear for all you can see and all that remains hidden still, you, though, who can handle it, because you are you, and you do, and you will, handle this, whatever it is, each and every moment, handling bundles in your own occasional bungling fumbling but sweetly human and visibly trying way, you and you, each of you, bright star flashing for someone else’s road home, again and always, shining, shining, is the news in literary magazines.
Have a most extraordinary week, pals.
Fondly,
Becky
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The whole way that Gettysburg College has gone about closing the GR just added salt to the wound...it's interesting because I it *is* clear that much could be done to 1) shift additional fundraising responsibility to the magazine and/or 2) restructure the magazine so it did play a more central role in the experiences of students on campus. But obviously the administration is simply not interested--this is a value judgment,--about the importance of literary arts -- no matter what they say. At any rate, many thanks for linking to my article and substack. Really appreciate it!!!
Gettysburg: left my 2 cents worth on X, but here it is again: Gettysburg Review—without it, the college has no brand. It’s just another college. This decision had to have been made somewhat injudiciously if not recklessly. Sorry, but that’s how it appears. The review is a bulwark against illiteracy and Gettysburg Review is top tier.