Speaking of literary magazines: I know I’ve recently mentioned the Virginia Quarterly Review as one of the most relevant and exciting literary journals available but I feel that I should do so again. Here’s Ted Genoways defending his publication (VQR) against an attack from Zyzzyva editor Howard Junker. I wouldn’t bring it up except 1) I think he’s absolutely right and 2) he speaks to a problem that many arts and humanities organizations have, namely that all of us in those fields think our work is important.
Certainly our work is personally fulfilling, but we also feel it deserves a wider audience and that a wider audience deserves access to those works. In an age of thinning endowment dollars for arts and humanities print publications, it seems impossible to me that Junker would be going out of his way to limit his readership, so he probably isn’t. Rather, it seems that Genoways’ comment is more accurate and Junker’s comments are the talk of “the last place finisher who says he never really wanted to win anyway.”
Hoosierati 