Simmons Buntin, Founder of Terrain.org
Jamison Crabtree, Editor of Spork!
Alison H. Deming, University of Arizona
We began the evening rather quietly, with Alison asking each of us to reflect on Steve Orlen, beloved poet, teacher and friend, who passed away quite suddenly last week. “There was no bitterness,” Alison said. “He accepted his fate.”
January 22nd has been marked as the set date for a time of remembrance. There are also plans to archive Steve’s office—really his second home—for the Poetry Center’s collection. All donations are requested to be sent to the Poetry Center.
Then launched into the topic at hand:
Talk about your background, how do you each begin your process?
Simmons: “The journal actually started before it ever came into existence. As a young, budding poet, I wanted to combine the literary context with environmental concerns. I wanted something technical, that addressed the environment, but also pieces that expressed the literary element.
But, we had no money and no experience to start a print journal. So that’s how we decided to go online. This was 1997, when the Internet was still fairly new. At the time, we didn’t really see
Jamison: “It’s really important, having those technical skills. That’s kind of how I started, and it gave me a really good feel as to how journals can streamline their process. I moved to Arizona and started working for Sonora, and then hooked up with Spork!, hand binding the chapbooks, using the letterpress. You need just basic equipment and an affinity with arts and crafts stores. Materials are everywhere,” he said, as he told us the newest issue of Sonora Review has a spine that’s made of Whole Foods paper bags.
Alison: “I’m the imposter,” she joked, but then went on to share with us her experience living and working within the writing and publishing arenas during the 60s and 70s. “Everything was low-production cost, nobody cared what it looked like. Now, the object speaks to its own aesthetic value. The result is that we get an absolutely exquisite object that goes along with a literary threshold.”
Both Alison and Jamison brought materials with them to share: chapbooks, high-cost production journals like Orion, broadsides.
Is going online really the least expensive way to start a literary journal?
Simmons: “Right now, yes. The only costs are paying for your domain name and website. We currently don’t pay our writers, but we’re able to be selective in our process. Our next step is to apply for nonprofit status. You really can’t get grant money unless you are nonprofit.”
Jamison: “We mostly pay for the costs. Book-by-book. But they’re not really expensive putting together, just time-consuming.”
How many books are in a run?
Jamison: “We currently print out about 50-100 at a time. We pay about $100-200 for the website per year, and about $50 for the designer.”
Given how many journals there are, how necessary is it to have a theme or a niche, a deliberate focus?
Simmons: “I don’t think you need that niche, but it certainly helps. We’ve been able to partner and collaborate with a lot of writers just because of our specific focus. I really think of Terrain as a journal about place, internal or external, and so having that theme also helps in terms of press releases: different environmental businesses, companies, and other presses.”
Jamison: “Having a clear idea for your audience and caring about your tick on things. Steve Orlen, for instance, would read poems through line-by-line. He read the work without his ego. I feel this is really important for any literary publication. You want to get the work out there and let it stand for itself.”
Simmons: “I really think a journal is only as good as its editors. You really have to care about the work.”
Jamison: “Actively try and push the work further. Simmons, for instance, nominates pieces elsewhere (ie: Pushcart Prize).”
How else do you push your work?
Alison: “Book fairs, AWP. Great venues for getting your name out there.”
Jamison: “If you can give away stuff, give away stuff. But be friendly, be available.”
How many people are helping you at a time?
Jamison: “We have about 3-4 pretty steady people, and then 5 or 6 people who come and go.”
Simmons: “It’s really helped having the MFA program here. Up until about a year ago, I didn’t have any assistant editors; I was doing all the work myself. Now I have genre editors and am getting an intern. All these steps are helping us expand.”
Overall, I got the sense that having people work with you not only helps balance the workload, but also helps balance the journal’s direction and future.
What exactly is the advisory board’s relationship to these magazines?
Alison: “It varies from publication to publication. Part is as a contributing editor, and then, as in Orion’s case, they like to bring all the members together in a sort of think tank setting. The board is sometimes there to keep the editor from feeling lonely. It’s also a big part to get the magazine well-known writers and therefore adding cache and a reputation for the magazine.”
Jamison: “We’re really set up more as a collective, where the editors decide which projects we want to work on, and then pursuing those projects.”
Simmons: “Ours is not really a hands-on role…but I’m still pretty much a control freak, so we’ll see how that goes!”
The discussion took a turn here into multi-media production and re-thinking page layout (and even what a page means). A huge deal is color printing versus online color.
Alison asked the group our own involvement in presses and publications, and some of us mentioned writing blogs. “The quality of work,” Jamison offered, “whether a blog or otherwise, is crucial.”
The issue of quarterly versus bi-yearly came up, and Simmons mentioned how important it is to make comments and have a blog, to “extend the life of the publication.”
From the other side of things, those of us who are looking to publish are wanting insight into what those publications are looking for, how they function, etc.
Simmons: “We always send pieces back for review before publication.”
Jamison: “Going back to the ‘put a piece in a sock drawer for six months’, I feel as though that’s almost equivalent to putting it in the drawer.”
Alison: “You have to be the final judiciary voice in your publications. You don’t want to be so hungry for publication that you embarrass yourself in the process. And a rejection letter from an editor doesn’t mean the piece isn’t good: it might just mean it’s not good for that particular publication.”
Find a group of editors with which you can build a relationship.
