Map Literary publishes poems & prose poems, short stories & short-shorts, scholarly essays & creative nonfiction, and art.
We also run the Rachel Wetzsteon Chapbook Award every other year, as well as a writing contest for New Jersey high school students.
We do not consider work that has previously appeared elsewhere, either in print or on the web.
Please include a brief bio in the "cover letter" field when you submit.
We accept simultaneous submissions but expect to be notified in a timely manner if the work has been accepted elsewhere.
For fiction and nonfiction, submit one piece at a time for consideration; do not send a second piece until you have received a response to the first. You may, however, submit in more than one genre at a time. For poetry, submit 3-5 poems at a time; please send only one file.
We value provocative themes, experimental works, genre confoundings, fugue complexities, beautiful syntax, original voices, aesthetic risk-taking, creative research, ethnic hybridity, gorgeous paperweights.
We dislike clichés, gimmicks, SUVs, righteousness, PowerPoint presentations, nuclear arsenals, talking heads.
Thematic cartographers, we want to model today’s ethical, ethnic, and aesthetic realities. We look foward to hearing from you.
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Please be so kind as to subscribe to our occasional newsletter and follow us on Facebook.
John Parras: "I am particularly drawn to fiction with a poetic texture--fiction that employs intense figurative language and sophisticated prose rhythms. I like magic realism, experimental fiction, and sudden fiction (750-1000 words). I have recently been enjoying stories by David Means, Ben Marcus, Victor Pelevin, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya, Cormac McCarthy's 'Blood Meridian,' Paul Harding's 'tinkers,' and the beautiful sentences of Rivka Galchen."
Martha Witt: "I admire fiction that simultaneously surprises and convinces. When I read narratives with outrageous premises or unexpected twists that, in the end, seem absolutely inevitable, I am in awe. The emotional component is crucial, of course. Even great technique cannot save a story that offers its readers no emotional connection. Alice Munro, Deborah Eisenberg, John Barth, and Andrew Sean Greer write the kind of short stories I turn to again and again."
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Please be so kind as to subscribe to our occasional newsletter and follow us on Facebook.
Christopher Salerno: "I'm drawn to poetry that knows what year it is. Regardless of school or allegiance, my favorite lyric or meditative poems exist as a record of a process. They allow themselves to be in uncertainties. They beg to be reread, even if they’re simple. They may be simple. They may contain variants, diversions, or hiccups. Tonally, they may contain multitudes. A medley of historical references might include such hits as Keats' "Negative Capability," Lorca's "Duende," Frank O'Hara's "Personism," and the careful attentiveness of Charles Olson's "Projective Verse." Some of my favorite Small Press Poetry Publishers right now include: Wave Books, Birds LLC, Black Ocean, Ahsahta Press, Flood Editions, Wesleyan, Cleveland State University Poetry Center, Octopus Books, and others.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR DONATION SUPPORTING THE WRITING ARTS!
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Creative nonfiction or scholarly essays; book & cultural reviews; author interviews. We are looking for writers who are engaged by contemporary cultural issues and who have explored forms such as the segmented essay, poetic prose, the braided essay, and the position piece. Also welcome are personal essays, travel essays, and memoir by writers who demonstrate both a strong sense of place and a range of content that extends beyond the confessional.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR DONATION SUPPORTING THE WRITING ARTS!