April 27th, 2010 / 8:03 pm
Snippets
Snippets
Roxane Gay—
Lincoln Michel, frequent HTMLGIANT commenter and co-editor of Gigantic, has offered a ranking of literary magazines. Magazines I would have considered First Tier, for example, were in the Second Tier–The Missouri Review comes to mind, not in terms of say, my personal preference but in terms of prestige. Rankings are, ultimately, an impossible thing but I thought the rankings were really interesting.
Good list. I subscribe to at least one from the first 4 tiers.
Harper’s magazine is really excellent, as is the Threepenny Review. I think McSweeney’s would be in the top tier for me. Ninth Letter would be second or even first tier.
Magazines are amazing. I feel bad for people who don’t subscribe to a few.
Hey, thanks for the link!
Missouri Review is a fantastic journal and would probably make first tier if I expanded it. I tried to keep my top tier just the last of the titan glossy mags that still publish fiction plus the handful of biggest literary mags (which I took to be The Paris Review, Granta, McSweeney’s and Tin House). All depends on where you set the bar I suppose.
And, of course, it is all about what journals you really love, not anyone’s ranking.
no word riot? bah. taking my ball and going home.
“Duotrope is a great service, but unselective and easier to use once you have a basic understand of the journals out there.”
Yeah, really offended to not be on the radar of that particular “editor.”
Not sure what you find objectionable in that quote?
If you write a “typical” literary story and want to submit it, go to Duotrope and search for “literary” fiction you get 1733 results, many of which are probably completely inappropriate and would take forever to click on every one of those links and learn about each magazine to figure out what to submit to.
If you have a general idea about what good journals are out there, Duotrope is great though. Even limiting to semi-pro payment and up (which cuts out a lot of great journals that don’t pay), you have a full 229 returns.
I don’t see why Zoetrope isn’t among the elite PR, Granta, McS & Tin House. And hasn’t Electric Literature revolutionized 21st century literary magazine possibilities in a very short time? And aren’t nearly every single one of its contributors among the baddest of the badasses? Hmmm…
I don’t see Zoetrope as being quite as big as those four. I would say that they, along with Ploughshares and Conjunctions, would be right on the boarder.
EL is a tough call because they’ve only just started, but they have a ton of buzz, pay a bunch and have pretty huge names in every issue.
I think he meant the typo.
Was nice to see Puerto get a little love. With these criteria it makes sense to put us there, to me. Planning to keep climbing, of course.
ah, the perils of blog writing.
Oh! Had no idea that was you. fwiw, I think it’s a useful article.
Precisely. New doesn’t necessarily equal less potent. I know Conjunctions is renowned as well, for good reason, definitely old-school, too, in that last time I checked they only take paper subs and want exclusives. Does Ploughshares still live up to its rep? I haven’t read it in years. With Zoetrope you not only get paid but you also option film rights. I’d like to know how many films have been made from Zoetrope stories. That would seal the deal, no?
Ploughshares tops the pushcart ranking from the last 10 years by a good stretch, for what that’s worth.
Narrative as third tier … eh, I think it should be a no tier.
I was just reading that on the Perpetual Folly link you posted. What is it worth? Is the Pushcart really exemplary v. the O’Henry and Best American Shorts? I had a girlfriend who received BASS every year as a gift. We went out for a long time. I thought the picks were hit or miss. How much of this stuff is a celebrity contest?
Sketchy sub policy but a good rep. Why is that?
Well the thing it is worth the most is easy online browsing! BASS doesn’t list its winners online past 08 and while O. Henry lists lifetime totals, it doesn’t show you recent history.
I don’t believe the Pushcart is a superior prize to those others. However, for ranking purposes it does have a unique submission format and tends to have a broader scope from the other lists, in large part because it is so much larger. More stories get in.
I’m not a fan of their sub policy at all, but hard to deny that they pay a lot and get big names.
This is probably a stupid question to even ask, but how would you say this list fares for poetry (not counting, of course, the journals on the list that only publish fiction, and ignoring exclusions of big poetry-only journals like jubilat and Octopus [don’t know if you count Octopus as “big”, but w/e]). I mean, are there any that might move up/down a tier with regard to poetry, or would you say it holds basically steady? I know poetry probably isn’t your major point of interest, Lincoln, though I think you’ve published a few poems? I also realize this is sort of a subjective list, but I am still curious about your opinions, if any.
Good list. I subscribe to at least one from the first 4 tiers.
Harper’s magazine is really excellent, as is the Threepenny Review. I think McSweeney’s would be in the top tier for me. Ninth Letter would be second or even first tier.
Magazines are amazing. I feel bad for people who don’t subscribe to a few.
Well, I have indeed published some poems, but I can’t pretend to know much about the poetry world. It seems different than fiction in many ways. Also, I’ve talked to countless fiction writers about magazines and ran this list by several, but have never talked in depth with poets about magazines.
That said, my guess is that if you deleted fiction-only journals and added the big poetry-only journals (Poetry, Jubilat, etc) the list would basically hold steady.
My guess is that, with a very few exceptions aside, journals are really only known for being good, not for being good in a specific genre. Outside of a few of the larger journals like the New Yorker, I’ve basically never heard that discussed about a journal. Also, so many writers write both that when you see a cover letter you just notice how good the journals are and can’t assume if the poems were in X but the stories were in Y.
That’s my thought, but if someone more knowledgeable about poetry disagrees you should probably listen to them.
Hey, thanks for the link!
Missouri Review is a fantastic journal and would probably make first tier if I expanded it. I tried to keep my top tier just the last of the titan glossy mags that still publish fiction plus the handful of biggest literary mags (which I took to be The Paris Review, Granta, McSweeney’s and Tin House). All depends on where you set the bar I suppose.
And, of course, it is all about what journals you really love, not anyone’s ranking.
no word riot? bah. taking my ball and going home.
They pay a lot and get big names because they charge an obscene reading fee from novice writers who don’t know any better. You really think those big names pay any kind of reading fee? Not a chance. If novice writers knew better and stopped submitting, there would go all the money to pay the big names and without the big names the journal would no longer have a leg to stand on.
“Duotrope is a great service, but unselective and easier to use once you have a basic understand of the journals out there.”
Yeah, really offended to not be on the radar of that particular “editor.”
Not sure what you find objectionable in that quote?
If you write a “typical” literary story and want to submit it, go to Duotrope and search for “literary” fiction you get 1733 results, many of which are probably completely inappropriate and would take forever to click on every one of those links and learn about each magazine to figure out what to submit to.
If you have a general idea about what good journals are out there, Duotrope is great though. Even limiting to semi-pro payment and up (which cuts out a lot of great journals that don’t pay), you have a full 229 returns.
I don’t see why Zoetrope isn’t among the elite PR, Granta, McS & Tin House. And hasn’t Electric Literature revolutionized 21st century literary magazine possibilities in a very short time? And aren’t nearly every single one of its contributors among the baddest of the badasses? Hmmm…
I don’t see Zoetrope as being quite as big as those four. I would say that they, along with Ploughshares and Conjunctions, would be right on the boarder.
EL is a tough call because they’ve only just started, but they have a ton of buzz, pay a bunch and have pretty huge names in every issue.
I think he meant the typo.
Was nice to see Puerto get a little love. With these criteria it makes sense to put us there, to me. Planning to keep climbing, of course.
ah, the perils of blog writing.
Oh! Had no idea that was you. fwiw, I think it’s a useful article.
Precisely. New doesn’t necessarily equal less potent. I know Conjunctions is renowned as well, for good reason, definitely old-school, too, in that last time I checked they only take paper subs and want exclusives. Does Ploughshares still live up to its rep? I haven’t read it in years. With Zoetrope you not only get paid but you also option film rights. I’d like to know how many films have been made from Zoetrope stories. That would seal the deal, no?
Ploughshares tops the pushcart ranking from the last 10 years by a good stretch, for what that’s worth.
Narrative as third tier … eh, I think it should be a no tier.
I was just reading that on the Perpetual Folly link you posted. What is it worth? Is the Pushcart really exemplary v. the O’Henry and Best American Shorts? I had a girlfriend who received BASS every year as a gift. We went out for a long time. I thought the picks were hit or miss. How much of this stuff is a celebrity contest?
Sketchy sub policy but a good rep. Why is that?
Well the thing it is worth the most is easy online browsing! BASS doesn’t list its winners online past 08 and while O. Henry lists lifetime totals, it doesn’t show you recent history.
I don’t believe the Pushcart is a superior prize to those others. However, for ranking purposes it does have a unique submission format and tends to have a broader scope from the other lists, in large part because it is so much larger. More stories get in.
I’m not a fan of their sub policy at all, but hard to deny that they pay a lot and get big names.
This is probably a stupid question to even ask, but how would you say this list fares for poetry (not counting, of course, the journals on the list that only publish fiction, and ignoring exclusions of big poetry-only journals like jubilat and Octopus [don’t know if you count Octopus as “big”, but w/e]). I mean, are there any that might move up/down a tier with regard to poetry, or would you say it holds basically steady? I know poetry probably isn’t your major point of interest, Lincoln, though I think you’ve published a few poems? I also realize this is sort of a subjective list, but I am still curious about your opinions, if any.
Well, I have indeed published some poems, but I can’t pretend to know much about the poetry world. It seems different than fiction in many ways. Also, I’ve talked to countless fiction writers about magazines and ran this list by several, but have never talked in depth with poets about magazines.
That said, my guess is that if you deleted fiction-only journals and added the big poetry-only journals (Poetry, Jubilat, etc) the list would basically hold steady.
My guess is that, with a very few exceptions aside, journals are really only known for being good, not for being good in a specific genre. Outside of a few of the larger journals like the New Yorker, I’ve basically never heard that discussed about a journal. Also, so many writers write both that when you see a cover letter you just notice how good the journals are and can’t assume if the poems were in X but the stories were in Y.
That’s my thought, but if someone more knowledgeable about poetry disagrees you should probably listen to them.
They pay a lot and get big names because they charge an obscene reading fee from novice writers who don’t know any better. You really think those big names pay any kind of reading fee? Not a chance. If novice writers knew better and stopped submitting, there would go all the money to pay the big names and without the big names the journal would no longer have a leg to stand on.
I know Sean Lovelace has footstomped the “if you’re submittng you should be subscribing” mantra that Lincoln espouses in his article. I respectfully disagree. I write and write and write and never get jack for it. That’s okay, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to feel guilty for not shelling out hundreds (thousands?) a year on journals to allieve any guilt about not “supporting” them. The idea that broke-ass writers should feel responsible for paying for journals they submit to is insane. I subscribe to a few journals but I submit to some others as well. Mainly though I just submit to online journals and/or print journals that take online subs.
Also, this article feels very traditional in its focus on print journals, excluding such journals as Word Riot, Pedestal, PANK, Electric Literature (I “get” that it’s new but still).
I refuse to submit to any journal who only allows for paper copies via regular mail (with SASE, often to boot). FUCK THAT. If a journal won’t get an online sub manager or accept e-mail subs, fuck ’em.
i agree to a point with the idea that writers shouldn’t necessarily be the only ones supporting journals. readers should be; and as a reader i happily subscribe to several journals, some of which i don’t submit to, in fact. which is why i don’t support submission fees without a free alternative for the most part. but i think part of the argument to submit to journals you read/subscribe to or whatever is submitting to journals you like and know well. as an editor, there is little more annoying (ok, there are some things) than reading dozens of submissions from eager writers who have clearly never read the magazine. or who have been to the site and recognized a name or two or something. i don’t know if this is sean’s main argument at all, but it’s how i try to work.
also, PANK is on the list. i think lists like this are always going to be personal, subjective and totally problematic. but lincoln admits as much in his intro.
agreed, jensen, and good catch on PANK. i screwed that up.
bottom line is that of course writers have little/no shot of getting into certain journals if they’ve never read said journals. of course, i read all sorts of internet literary journals and still struggle with certain stories in terms of where to send. i know i’m not alone in that. but yes as an editor it is annoying when someone sends our lit journal a cowboy story with lots of yee ha references or a fantasy story with vague refrences to quiddich.
I think you’re crazy putting Gulf Coast on the fifth tier. Lower than the Mississippi Review? Than Five Points? Tied with Meridian? The Mississippi Review only even prints 500 copies of an issue, if I’m not mistaken. Maybe I’m just looking at it from a poetry perspective, but I think GC is a much better venue than those three, at the very least. Maybe I should get a blog or something and make my own version of this list that everybody can find problems with.
I mean, the author is crazy. Not “you,” Roxane.
Thanks a lot. The idea of a journal only being good, not being good in a genre, makes sense now that I see it.
Lincoln, this is a good list. When I first started submitting, I looked and looked and found nothing like it, so I ended up making my own–but only after lots and lots of research and trial and error etc. I bet a lot of young writers are eagerly copying down this list right now. :)
planning on clawing my way up to that 4th tier someday…
Just speculating: Do you think the fact that poetry’s relevance in the broader/mass culture has been on the wane/non-existent even longer than (literary) fiction’s makes external hierarchies even less relevant to poets, so maybe more poets operate w/ less insecurity abt what might “get them ahead” in some imaginary game (I know you’re occupying a critical position w/ relation to the notion of magazine hierarchies even as you present one, but still think Mike Young’s January 09 post is important to bring into any conversation abt this stuff – http://htmlgiant.com/web-journals/magazine-databases-magazine-debasers/), and are more likely to submit based upon who publishes work that excites them (operating, one might suggest, from a more evolved position than those vast hordes of insecure fiction writers)? Or are there other other, poetry-specific hierarchies, like maybe ones affecting poets trying to work in academia?
It’s not just Pank that’s on the list — I think Pedestal and Electric Literature are also.
And I don’t think anybody is suggesting you should subscribe to every journal you submit to — a few subscriptions is great.
Hmm, maybe I was unclear, but I definitely did not mean you should subscribe to EVERY magazine you submit to. Obviously that is financially impossible. I meant you should subscribe to at least a couple.
Both PANK and Electric Lit were on my list. EL quite high actually.
Hey Glenn, one the one hand I hate explaining where I’m ranking journals at it feels like I’m insulting them to point out lack of qualifications or something. In short, Mississippi Review (which is maybe the best online journal, even if it doesn’t print many copies) and Five Points both clean up in the Pushcart Prize, both are in the top 30 there.
Gulf Coast was in the 80s.
But again, any journal on this list is a really good one IMHO.
It’s tough to come up with any kind of ultimate ranking system for journals, sure. It would be almost impossible to take into consideration everything that makes a journal great. How could one even measure “quality” without letting personal aesthetic biases enter into the equation? Or how could one measure a journal’s print run as a quality, when online journals can get thousands of more readers than an average printed journal? I guess I just took offense because I think Gulf Coast is a great journal, and some of those other ones are not so great. But I’m on the internet, so of course I’m offended.
Just to clarify one thing, I’m NOT trying to measure quality, only status. If I was measuring quality, the list would look completely different. For example, I think the quality of elimae is extremely high. But it doesn’t have the status of, say, The Paris Review.
This is not to say my biases haven’t crept in here or there aren’t problems with the ranking though
Thanks. Curious how it compares to yours…
I know Sean Lovelace has footstomped the “if you’re submittng you should be subscribing” mantra that Lincoln espouses in his article. I respectfully disagree. I write and write and write and never get jack for it. That’s okay, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to feel guilty for not shelling out hundreds (thousands?) a year on journals to allieve any guilt about not “supporting” them. The idea that broke-ass writers should feel responsible for paying for journals they submit to is insane. I subscribe to a few journals but I submit to some others as well. Mainly though I just submit to online journals and/or print journals that take online subs.
Also, this article feels very traditional in its focus on print journals, excluding such journals as Word Riot, Pedestal, PANK, Electric Literature (I “get” that it’s new but still).
I refuse to submit to any journal who only allows for paper copies via regular mail (with SASE, often to boot). FUCK THAT. If a journal won’t get an online sub manager or accept e-mail subs, fuck ’em.
Tim, I don’t know a lot myself, but as far as poetry-specific hierarchies for poets in academia, they exist. I have had a poet who is a doctoral candidate in the creative writing program at the university I go to tell me multiple times to not submit to online journals ever. To just not do it. Except he recommended Diagram because he said it gets picked up by Verse Daily a lot. He’s a really great writer, but he tells anyone who asks that it isn’t worth it to submit to online journals precisely because he doesn’t think they will “get you ahead”. I don’t think this is only his opinion, I think it’s a view held by the majority of the department here. I guess I can’t speak for all poets in academia, only in my own limited scope, but there’s that.
i agree to a point with the idea that writers shouldn’t necessarily be the only ones supporting journals. readers should be; and as a reader i happily subscribe to several journals, some of which i don’t submit to, in fact. which is why i don’t support submission fees without a free alternative for the most part. but i think part of the argument to submit to journals you read/subscribe to or whatever is submitting to journals you like and know well. as an editor, there is little more annoying (ok, there are some things) than reading dozens of submissions from eager writers who have clearly never read the magazine. or who have been to the site and recognized a name or two or something. i don’t know if this is sean’s main argument at all, but it’s how i try to work.
also, PANK is on the list. i think lists like this are always going to be personal, subjective and totally problematic. but lincoln admits as much in his intro.
Really, really similar, actually. Which makes me happy because I was mostly guessing and I know dick about publications. I had Conjunctions and McSweeney’s and Zoetrope all a tier higher, had Georgia Review and Kenyon Review switched (I don’t even remember why) and NOON was a tier lower. (Not because of quality–I love NOON! I’d rather read it than lots of others. I just wasn’t sure what its reach was.) I also had all my web publications sort of separate. Curious as to how you picked the web pubs that you did.
Not just the typo. That sentence needed to be edited for clarity. It’s like a welfare mom going out and snatching up kids from the suburbs because their parents are unfit.
agreed, jensen, and good catch on PANK. i screwed that up.
bottom line is that of course writers have little/no shot of getting into certain journals if they’ve never read said journals. of course, i read all sorts of internet literary journals and still struggle with certain stories in terms of where to send. i know i’m not alone in that. but yes as an editor it is annoying when someone sends our lit journal a cowboy story with lots of yee ha references or a fantasy story with vague refrences to quiddich.
McSweeney’s is in my top tier. As I said earlier Conjunctions, Zoetrope and Ploughshares would be the next three to jump to first tier if I expanded it.
Noon is a bit of a tough call for me since I’m in the current issue (however, they were in my second tier long before I was ever accepted)… Despite coming out once a year, and thus having less material to choose from, NOON wins a lot of awards and on the Pushcart Ranking they have been the fastest climbers alongside One Story and Mississippi Review.
I think you’re crazy putting Gulf Coast on the fifth tier. Lower than the Mississippi Review? Than Five Points? Tied with Meridian? The Mississippi Review only even prints 500 copies of an issue, if I’m not mistaken. Maybe I’m just looking at it from a poetry perspective, but I think GC is a much better venue than those three, at the very least. Maybe I should get a blog or something and make my own version of this list that everybody can find problems with.
I mean, the author is crazy. Not “you,” Roxane.
well shit, tim, don’t go confusing me with the facts
i’ll re-read the list again when i can (i glanced at it but since posting wasn’t able to pull it up).
i’ll go fuck myself now
FUCK george plimpton and the paris review and FUCK you, sir
George Plimpton is dead, dawg.
sorry for my younger bro, lincoln. he’s got this idea he’s going to strike it rich as a writer and sometimes gets fired up.
in 20 years when everything is online … no one will have an excuse not to read the journals they submit to. we will all laugh at the “prestige” print used to have
Eggsactly, sir, eggsactly. Score one for K & C.
Thanks a lot. The idea of a journal only being good, not being good in a genre, makes sense now that I see it.
Lincoln, this is a good list. When I first started submitting, I looked and looked and found nothing like it, so I ended up making my own–but only after lots and lots of research and trial and error etc. I bet a lot of young writers are eagerly copying down this list right now. :)
planning on clawing my way up to that 4th tier someday…
Just speculating: Do you think the fact that poetry’s relevance in the broader/mass culture has been on the wane/non-existent even longer than (literary) fiction’s makes external hierarchies even less relevant to poets, so maybe more poets operate w/ less insecurity abt what might “get them ahead” in some imaginary game (I know you’re occupying a critical position w/ relation to the notion of magazine hierarchies even as you present one, but still think Mike Young’s January 09 post is important to bring into any conversation abt this stuff – http://htmlgiant.com/web-journals/magazine-databases-magazine-debasers/), and are more likely to submit based upon who publishes work that excites them (operating, one might suggest, from a more evolved position than those vast hordes of insecure fiction writers)? Or are there other other, poetry-specific hierarchies, like maybe ones affecting poets trying to work in academia?
It’s not just Pank that’s on the list — I think Pedestal and Electric Literature are also.
And I don’t think anybody is suggesting you should subscribe to every journal you submit to — a few subscriptions is great.
Hmm, maybe I was unclear, but I definitely did not mean you should subscribe to EVERY magazine you submit to. Obviously that is financially impossible. I meant you should subscribe to at least a couple.
Both PANK and Electric Lit were on my list. EL quite high actually.
Hey Glenn, one the one hand I hate explaining where I’m ranking journals at it feels like I’m insulting them to point out lack of qualifications or something. In short, Mississippi Review (which is maybe the best online journal, even if it doesn’t print many copies) and Five Points both clean up in the Pushcart Prize, both are in the top 30 there.
Gulf Coast was in the 80s.
But again, any journal on this list is a really good one IMHO.
It’s tough to come up with any kind of ultimate ranking system for journals, sure. It would be almost impossible to take into consideration everything that makes a journal great. How could one even measure “quality” without letting personal aesthetic biases enter into the equation? Or how could one measure a journal’s print run as a quality, when online journals can get thousands of more readers than an average printed journal? I guess I just took offense because I think Gulf Coast is a great journal, and some of those other ones are not so great. But I’m on the internet, so of course I’m offended.
Just to clarify one thing, I’m NOT trying to measure quality, only status. If I was measuring quality, the list would look completely different. For example, I think the quality of elimae is extremely high. But it doesn’t have the status of, say, The Paris Review.
This is not to say my biases haven’t crept in here or there aren’t problems with the ranking though
Thanks. Curious how it compares to yours…
Tim, I don’t know a lot myself, but as far as poetry-specific hierarchies for poets in academia, they exist. I have had a poet who is a doctoral candidate in the creative writing program at the university I go to tell me multiple times to not submit to online journals ever. To just not do it. Except he recommended Diagram because he said it gets picked up by Verse Daily a lot. He’s a really great writer, but he tells anyone who asks that it isn’t worth it to submit to online journals precisely because he doesn’t think they will “get you ahead”. I don’t think this is only his opinion, I think it’s a view held by the majority of the department here. I guess I can’t speak for all poets in academia, only in my own limited scope, but there’s that.
Really, really similar, actually. Which makes me happy because I was mostly guessing and I know dick about publications. I had Conjunctions and McSweeney’s and Zoetrope all a tier higher, had Georgia Review and Kenyon Review switched (I don’t even remember why) and NOON was a tier lower. (Not because of quality–I love NOON! I’d rather read it than lots of others. I just wasn’t sure what its reach was.) I also had all my web publications sort of separate. Curious as to how you picked the web pubs that you did.
Not just the typo. That sentence needed to be edited for clarity. It’s like a welfare mom going out and snatching up kids from the suburbs because their parents are unfit.
McSweeney’s is in my top tier. As I said earlier Conjunctions, Zoetrope and Ploughshares would be the next three to jump to first tier if I expanded it.
Noon is a bit of a tough call for me since I’m in the current issue (however, they were in my second tier long before I was ever accepted)… Despite coming out once a year, and thus having less material to choose from, NOON wins a lot of awards and on the Pushcart Ranking they have been the fastest climbers alongside One Story and Mississippi Review.
well shit, tim, don’t go confusing me with the facts
i’ll re-read the list again when i can (i glanced at it but since posting wasn’t able to pull it up).
i’ll go fuck myself now
FUCK george plimpton and the paris review and FUCK you, sir
George Plimpton is dead, dawg.
sorry for my younger bro, lincoln. he’s got this idea he’s going to strike it rich as a writer and sometimes gets fired up.
in 20 years when everything is online … no one will have an excuse not to read the journals they submit to. we will all laugh at the “prestige” print used to have
Eggsactly, sir, eggsactly. Score one for K & C.
I’ve heard that mentioned to (to not submit to online journals), though I think that will change. How can it not? There are some really great online journals out there, and eventually it will be seen less as a trend and more as a normality.
like the “best of” categories of the years’ movies, albums, fried chicken sandwiches, etc, this ranking is mostly useless. sure, for people who are completely new to the legitimately overwhelming world of literary magazines, it probably helps them sort out who’s who and what’s what. in general, though, measures of prestige and pushcart wins are too different from the specific tastes of readers/submitters to be comparable. taste is subjective, and therefore beyond debate. it also means this kind of ranking will have little to no bearing on where many of us submit: i sure as shit don’t submit to the nyer, because i don’t care all that much for their fiction. the idea of a lit mag tier, then, should always be qualified with a *based on factor X. there is no objective tier.
in other words: why bother with rankings. sorry to lincoln, who clearly put lots of work into it and is taking heat, but this thing is an empty excercise.
Hi Lincoln–I enjoyed your list and think it’s an interesting idea. I would love to see your list according to quality of work too. It’d be a nice contrast (though maybe more uncomfortable to publish?).
I know you’d be getting even more shit if this was based on your idea of the mag’s “quality,” but I guess I don’t see the point in making a list that’s comprised largely of other people’s lists. LIke, here’s my list of the best NBA players: Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, and then the rest is the NBA’s list of all stars. Not exactly groundbreaking work, you know? (I should note that Barrelhouse isn’t on there, and it’s always a bummer to be excluded from the guest list, even if you think that club is bullshit, so maybe if we’d been in there, I’d feel differently, but I don’t think so).
I’ve heard that mentioned to (to not submit to online journals), though I think that will change. How can it not? There are some really great online journals out there, and eventually it will be seen less as a trend and more as a normality.
like the “best of” categories of the years’ movies, albums, fried chicken sandwiches, etc, this ranking is mostly useless. sure, for people who are completely new to the legitimately overwhelming world of literary magazines, it probably helps them sort out who’s who and what’s what. in general, though, measures of prestige and pushcart wins are too different from the specific tastes of readers/submitters to be comparable. taste is subjective, and therefore beyond debate. it also means this kind of ranking will have little to no bearing on where many of us submit: i sure as shit don’t submit to the nyer, because i don’t care all that much for their fiction. the idea of a lit mag tier, then, should always be qualified with a *based on factor X. there is no objective tier.
in other words: why bother with rankings. sorry to lincoln, who clearly put lots of work into it and is taking heat, but this thing is an empty excercise.
Hi Lincoln–I enjoyed your list and think it’s an interesting idea. I would love to see your list according to quality of work too. It’d be a nice contrast (though maybe more uncomfortable to publish?).
I know you’d be getting even more shit if this was based on your idea of the mag’s “quality,” but I guess I don’t see the point in making a list that’s comprised largely of other people’s lists. LIke, here’s my list of the best NBA players: Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, and then the rest is the NBA’s list of all stars. Not exactly groundbreaking work, you know? (I should note that Barrelhouse isn’t on there, and it’s always a bummer to be excluded from the guest list, even if you think that club is bullshit, so maybe if we’d been in there, I’d feel differently, but I don’t think so).
I must admit I’m one of the ones who loves best of lists and am always surprised that so many people get angry about them. I’m almost always reminded of films I forgot to see, albums that I should check out, or new chicken sandwich shops. Which is the point, isn’t it? Not really to “objectively rank” but to suggest things to check out.
If you know where you want to submit, you shouldn’t be swayed by my or anyone else’s ranking. I think I say as much in my intro.
You would be surprised though, I think, at how many writers are unaware of the magazines out there. Even writers who’ve been published in good places and been to MFA programs and presumably would know the landscape. Whenever I sent this to a friend I always got comments like “what’s New Letters?” or “I’ve never heard of Threepenny Review” etc. I mean, big huge journals. You don’t need to submit to them if you don’t like their taste—I don’t submit to most on this list—but you should be aware that they are out there.
But no offense taken, I’ve actually gotten a pretty positive response taken surprisingly little heat.
Thanks Nikkita.
I’m not sure I’d be uncomfortable posting a quality list as much as I think it would be impossible. I read more literary magazines than most people I know but I still haven’t read most of the magazines on this list, much less multiple issues of each, which you would probably need to do to get a real opinion.
It is a fair point, but as I said in my intro the lists that were available were missing a bunch of magazines I thought were pretty essential. So I guess I was putting Deron Williams and Dirk Nowitzki on a list because they were wrongly left off of all other lists.
My thinking is that people who aren’t interested in a list like this won’t care, but people who are will google them anyway. If people are going to google lists anyway, I might as well put one out there that I think is more accurate and doesn’t have any glaring omissions (although it is essential to note there are plenty of great magazines, such as Barrelhouse, that could still be included.)
I must admit I’m one of the ones who loves best of lists and am always surprised that so many people get angry about them. I’m almost always reminded of films I forgot to see, albums that I should check out, or new chicken sandwich shops. Which is the point, isn’t it? Not really to “objectively rank” but to suggest things to check out.
If you know where you want to submit, you shouldn’t be swayed by my or anyone else’s ranking. I think I say as much in my intro.
You would be surprised though, I think, at how many writers are unaware of the magazines out there. Even writers who’ve been published in good places and been to MFA programs and presumably would know the landscape. Whenever I sent this to a friend I always got comments like “what’s New Letters?” or “I’ve never heard of Threepenny Review” etc. I mean, big huge journals. You don’t need to submit to them if you don’t like their taste—I don’t submit to most on this list—but you should be aware that they are out there.
But no offense taken, I’ve actually gotten a pretty positive response taken surprisingly little heat.
Thanks Nikkita.
I’m not sure I’d be uncomfortable posting a quality list as much as I think it would be impossible. I read more literary magazines than most people I know but I still haven’t read most of the magazines on this list, much less multiple issues of each, which you would probably need to do to get a real opinion.
It is a fair point, but as I said in my intro the lists that were available were missing a bunch of magazines I thought were pretty essential. So I guess I was putting Deron Williams and Dirk Nowitzki on a list because they were wrongly left off of all other lists.
My thinking is that people who aren’t interested in a list like this won’t care, but people who are will google them anyway. If people are going to google lists anyway, I might as well put one out there that I think is more accurate and doesn’t have any glaring omissions (although it is essential to note there are plenty of great magazines, such as Barrelhouse, that could still be included.)
thanks lincoln. first off, it is always shocking how many people don’t know the landscape: granted, it’s a vast landscape, but so much remains invisible to people who only know a handfull of big name mags. second, i like your point that you learn new things from such lists too. maybe this a difference of wiring: my brain sees lists and goes “who cares about comparing apples and oranges” and yours goes “cool, teach me something new.” i’m giong to try to adopt a bit more of that latter perspective and ease off on the negative trip.
glad you’re getting less heat than i thought.
thanks lincoln. first off, it is always shocking how many people don’t know the landscape: granted, it’s a vast landscape, but so much remains invisible to people who only know a handfull of big name mags. second, i like your point that you learn new things from such lists too. maybe this a difference of wiring: my brain sees lists and goes “who cares about comparing apples and oranges” and yours goes “cool, teach me something new.” i’m giong to try to adopt a bit more of that latter perspective and ease off on the negative trip.
glad you’re getting less heat than i thought.
For the few that might care, I’ve updated the original list quite a bit and added a follow-up post.
i like the update, lincoln!
organic is good
Thanks! Yeah, trying to stress that this is more a list of magazines to check out and not some official hierarchy (I must say, I didn’t realize I”d get nearly as many hits as I did or maybe would have done it better the first time)
For the few that might care, I’ve updated the original list quite a bit and added a follow-up post.
i like the update, lincoln!
organic is good
Thanks! Yeah, trying to stress that this is more a list of magazines to check out and not some official hierarchy (I must say, I didn’t realize I”d get nearly as many hits as I did or maybe would have done it better the first time)