Ten Questions for Meng Jin
“I spent much of 2016 and 2017 not just trying to find my way back into the book but also trying to convince myself that art still mattered.” —Meng Jin, author of Little Gods
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Article Archive
Articles from Poet & Writers Magazine include material from the print edition plus exclusive online-only material.
Craft Capsule: Start, Stop, Change
“What needs to start? What needs to stop? What needs to change?” Mimi Lok shares an exercise that helps her persevere through difficult writing projects.
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GalleyCrush: The Malevolent Volume
Justin Phillip Reed’s The Malevolent Volume, forthcoming from Coffee House Press on April 7, 2020.
Ten Questions for Anna Wiener
“It was important to me to err on the side of generosity in writing this book.” —Anna Wiener, author of Uncanny Valley
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GalleyCrush: Verge
Lidia Yuknavitch’s Verge, forthcoming from Riverhead Books on February 4, 2020.
Ten Questions for Amanda Michalopoulou
“I write every day when I am in the middle of a novel. And I write intensely when I am in the middle of a short story or a poem. At all other times I blame myself for not writing.” —Amanda Michalopoulou, author of God's Wife
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Craft Capsule: The End
How do you know when to stop revising? Cameron Awkward-Rich shares a memorization exercise that helps him recognize when a poem is done.
Ten Questions for Barbara Crooker
“The most challenging thing every time I sit down to write is to make the poem on the page as alive as the poem in my head.” —Barbara Crooker, author of Some Glad Morning
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Craft Capsule: Elegy
Cameron Awkward-Rich weighs the ethical demands of elegy.
Ten Questions for Tommy Pico
“Fridays I would slash and burn upwards of 80 percent of that week’s word haul. Anything that stayed had to earn its keep.” —Tommy Pico, author of Feed
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Craft Capsule: Writing “After”
Cameron Awkward-Rich considers the possibilities and pitfalls of “after” poetry—poetry inspired by or borrowing from another writer’s work.
Open the Book
Artist Diane Samuels turns works of literature inside out in a dramatic process of creative rewriting that highlights the intimate relationship between writer and reader in a painstaking homage to the ultimate act of creativity: writing.
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Graphic Narrative Workshops
Courses in graphic storytelling gain popularity at MFA programs, workshops, and community spaces across the United States.
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Page One: Where New and Noteworthy Books Begin
The first lines of a dozen noteworthy books including Cleanness by Garth Greenwell and Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu.
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Poetic Lenses: Our Fifteenth Annual Look at Debut Poetry
Ten debut poets published in 2019, including Camonghne Felix and Jake Skeets, share their advice, inspiration, and path to publication.
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Inside Publishing: The Literary Agent Assistant
In the first installment of a yearlong series on publishing professionals, three literary agent assistants in New York City reveal the inner workings of a literary agency.
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Ahsahta Press Closes Its Doors
After more than forty years of publishing innovative poetry, Ahsahta Press will shutter in June 2020.
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The Anthologist: A Compendium of Uncommon Collections
A look inside three new anthologies, including A Map Is Only One Story: Twenty Writers on Immigration, Family, and the Meaning of Home edited by Nicole Chung and Mensah Demary.
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An Indie Alternative to Amazon?
Andy Hunter, the cofounder of Electric Literature and Literary Hub, launches Bookshop, an e-commerce platform that promises indie bookstores a way to take back sales from Amazon.
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Small Press Points: Trembling Pillow Press
The New Orleans press publishes four or five poetry titles a year in an eclectic range of styles.
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Literary MagNet: Beth Peterson
An author recommends five journals that published essays from her debut collection, Dispatches From the End of Ice.
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The Written Image: Shelley Jackson’s “Snow”
An author tells a fantastical story by writing it a word at a time in the snow.
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Q&A: Kelly Link Returns to Bookselling
The fiction writer on the twentieth anniversary of Small Beer Press and the opening of Book Moon, a bookstore in Massachusetts that she co-owns with her husband, Gavin J. Grant.
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Ten Questions for Jeffrey Colvin
“I had to imagine the life of characters who shared some of my own history but had their own unique ways of being in the world.” —Jeffrey Colvin, author of Africaville
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Craft Capsule: Revising the Archive
Cameron Awkward-Rich discusses turning archival research—traces of the past—into poems.