Luna Digest, 7/20

Though, as NPR reported this morning, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill may be finally capped and the “three oil and gas seeps on the seafloor near BP’s damaged oil well are not cause for serious alarm”—there are still millions and millions of gallons of oil above and (thanks to dispersants) beneath the surface of the ocean and covering some beaches. Gulf Coast lit mag from Houston is running a “Gulf Coast Clean-up” subscription drive. That’s right: two birds, one stone. Give money to Gulf Coast clean up efforts and get some great reading.

Last week’s digest post addressed the situation over at Mississippi Review. Since that post, the situation has been much discussed (and here and here).

Also from past digests: Denise Hill of New Pages offers up her thoughts on “Literary Magazine Submissions—How Much Would You Pay?” in response to the Tin House-gate controversy of the July 6 digest.

Over at Luna Park: New fiction from Sam Ruddick at Threepenny Review, Mary Miller on dreaming of a Pushcart, Nicholas Ripatrazone on sport (or sports) literature, and Kon Desmond interviews Singapore poet and editor Yeow Kai Chai. Here’s Yeow Kai on death and identity in his poetry:

I subscribe to Roland Barthes’ idea of the death of the author, of not relying on biographical details of the writer to distill meaning. Poetry for me is liberating: To be faceless is to be free.

Rock literature magazine Shaking Like a Mountain (co-founded by Vito Grippi) kicks out a new fiction contest.

Finally, Daniel Nester reports on “The Great Paris Review Poetry Purge” over at We Who Are About to Die. The gray lady of lit mags is rejecting already accepted poetry?

Picture this: you have your poems accepted by The Paris Review.  Such an acceptance can mark the start of a great career, lead to a book deal or to be anthologized, or perhaps solidify a reputation in the small world this correspondent and others call Poetryland…

…Then you get an email from Lorin Stein, the new editor of The Paris Review.  With perhaps the memory that there had been an announcement, written about in New York Observer, about a change at the Poetry Editor desk.

Dear XXXX,

Recently I replaced Philip Gourevitch as editor of The Paris Review and appointed a new poetry editor, Robyn Creswell. Over the last month, Robyn and I have been carefully reading the backlog of poetry that we inherited from the previous editors. This amounts to a year’s worth of poems. In order to give Robyn the scope to define his own section, I regret to say, we will not be able to publish everything accepted by Philip, Meghan, and Dan. We have not found a place for your three poems, though we see much to admire in them and gave them the most serious consideration. I am sorry to give you this bad news, and I’m grateful for your patience during the Review’s transition.

Best regards,
Lorin Stein

Read part two of Nester’s report.

Every Tuesday, Travis Kurowski presents Luna Digest, a selection of news from the world of literary magazines. Travis is the editor of Luna Park, a magazine founded on the idea that journals are as deserving of critical attention as other artistic works.