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The Present and Future of Literary Magazines
Emily Nemens with Leigh Anne Couch, Gerald Maa, and Patrick Ryan
A Note from Emily Nemens What should a literary magazine be? A community center, a career launch pad, a place for experimentation . . . There are as many answers as there are lit mags, but in this conversation between veteran editors Gerald Maa, Leigh Anne Couch, and Patrick Ryan, we discuss the present and future of their publications—The Georgia Review, SWING, and One Story, respectively—and the wider field of literary journals. I found this candid conversation to be particularly illuminating as these editors have seen a broad range of literary magazines, from DIY to legacy publications, from big-budget ownership to bootstrapping teams, and they can speak from experience about what it is like to work with a university, doing it on your own, and finding resources to keep their ventures afloat under trying circumstances. We talk about why encountering print still matters, how the internet is working for lit mags, and why the “middle” step of magazines is still so vital in the literary ecosystem. While editing the conversation, which took place on March 18, 2026, via Zoom, for clarity and length, I realized we didn’t talk about the specific “what” each editor is looking for in acquisition, but I hardly need to have asked it: These editors’ passion for great writing, for making opportunities to advance writers’ careers, for taking risks in their pages suggest that they are reading voraciously, editing ambitiously, and supporting writers at each step of the way. Read on to learn more about team building, keeping the lights on (but not, as Maa is quick to point out, being very profit-minded about it), and celebrating new writing, issue after issue.
A Note from Emily Nemens
What should a literary magazine be? A community center, a career launch pad, a place for experimentation . . . There are as many answers as there are lit mags, but in this conversation between veteran editors Gerald Maa, Leigh Anne Couch, and Patrick Ryan, we discuss the present and future of their publications—The Georgia Review, SWING, and One Story, respectively—and the wider field of literary journals.
I found this candid conversation to be particularly illuminating as these editors have seen a broad range of literary magazines, from DIY to legacy publications, from big-budget ownership to bootstrapping teams, and they can speak from experience about what it is like to work with a university, doing it on your own, and finding resources to keep their ventures afloat under trying circumstances. We talk about why encountering print still matters, how the internet is working for lit mags, and why the “middle” step of magazines is still so vital in the literary ecosystem. While editing the conversation, which took place on March 18, 2026, via Zoom, for clarity and length, I realized we didn’t talk about the specific “what” each editor is looking for in acquisition, but I hardly need to have asked it: These editors’ passion for great writing, for making opportunities to advance writers’ careers, for taking risks in their pages suggest that they are reading voraciously, editing ambitiously, and supporting writers at each step of the way. Read on to learn more about team building, keeping the lights on (but not, as Maa is quick to point out, being very profit-minded about it), and celebrating new writing, issue after issue.
Romantasy 101
Where Magic Meets Love—and Someone Probably Has Wings
The Big Conversation
Finding Home in the Long Middle
Finding Your Face
When Metaphor Becomes a Mask
Unsilencing History
The Art and Craft of the Substack Newsletter
From Isolation to Community
Oiling Your Armor
On Rejection and Remembering Why You Write
The Writer’s Chronicle is the official publication of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP).
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