Writing-related resources, news, and reflections to enjoy over the weekend.
“A new journal needs a reason to exist: a gap that earlier journals failed to fill, a new form of pleasure, a new kind of writing, an alliance with a new or under-chronicled social movement, a constellation of authors for whom the future demand for work exceeds present supply, a program that will actually change some small part of some literary readers’ tastes.” From Stephen Burt’s NewYorker.com essay on “The Persistence of Litmags.”
Midway through her year submitting poetry only to paying venues, Jessica Piazza takes stock.
Speaking of poetry: This week brought news of the passing of James Tate. I’m unschooled in his work, but I plan to read some of it soon (also: this “Art of Poetry” interview in The Paris Review).
In a new essay for The New York Times Book Review, Noelle Hovey suggests, “Whatever early memoirs lack in perspective, they make up in urgency, the sense that here is a story that must be told.” Ideally, yes. But I can’t help thinking that a considerable chunk of those memoirs-by-the-young lack both perspective and urgency. That’s the real problem.
And in case you didn’t already suspect as much, Michele Filgate’s LitHub dispatch confirms that Nantucket is a pretty nice place for a book festival.
Have a wonderful weekend.