On first glance, asking if there are too many literary magazines might seem akin to asking if there are too many writers or even too many readers. According to Duotrope, there are almost 5000 current markets for fiction, poetry, and non-fiction submissions. With all of these literary magazines out there, one has to wonder when enough is enough.
Whenever the door is opened for more participants, there is the potential for the quality of participation to go down. Take the sport of running as an example. Over the past few decades, there has unquestionably been a boom in participation. The number of runners is at an all-time high, as is the number of races. During this period, the average marathon time has slowed down substantially, even though the best runners are now faster than ever. Is the world getting slower, or are there simply more slow runners skewing the data? The numbers seem to suggest the latter.
Some might argue the same is happening to writers and publication. There are currently more publishing opportunities than ever. Between self-publishing and an endless offering of lit mags, anyone can lay claim to being a published writer these days.
Is the influx of writers a good thing for the literary community?
Unfortunately, much of what is “published” today just isn’t good. I’m not talking about genres I don’t like. I’m talking about work that is poorly written, poorly edited, and otherwise unfit for publication. Of course, some might ask who I am to judge what good literature is. After all, it’s all subjective. Was Faulkner really a better writer than Nicholas Sparks?
Naturally, there are actual distinctions between good writing and bad writing. Structure, diction, command of language, ability to develop a compelling narrative, etc. These are real things, and some people are better at them than others. I won’t definitively claim that Faulkner was any better than Sparks. They have different audiences, and there’s room for both of them as writers. Does that mean there’s room for The Rinky Dink Reviewnext to The New Yorker?
When reading some of these “lesser” publications, you certainly don’t get the same feeling you do from reading a piece in The New Yorker or Tin House. Even if these particular publications aren’t your cup of tea, there’s no denying that the work they publish is technically proficient. Sure, maybe you prefer to read a poorly edited magazine run by a friend who was kind enough to publish your story. It’s not much different than the fact that people choose to listen to Nickelback instead of Beethoven.
Is it really a bad thing to have this “less” proficient work out there, especially in a form publicly available for free? I’m not talking about the self-published market where people are just testing the waters to see if they can earn a living as a writer. I’m talking about the “real” publications with an editorial process.
Let’s go back to running for a second. Is the sport worse off because of increased participation (and the subsequent slowdown of the average)? There certainly are some runners–mostly sub-elites who spend their days exaggerating their accomplishments on the “world famous” Letsrun message boards. However, you don’t often hear real professionals complaining that too many people are running these days.
Sports–running in particular–and writing is more than an apt comparison. Both have become activities that anyone and everyone can do. Or, perhaps I should say everyone thinks they can do. In a recent Nike ad, the shoe and apparel giant said, “This is not about lowering expectations. It is about raising them for every last one of us. Because greatness is not in one special place and it is not in one special person. Greatness is wherever somebody is trying to find it.”
Having more literary magazines isn’t about lowering the expectations of writers. It’s about giving more people a voice. In recent years, I’ve read pieces in small online lit mags that could run circles around anything The New Yorker has published. While it’s certainly an accomplishment to be published by one of those big names, not getting published by them doesn’t make a writer a failure. The real success in writing lies in improving your craft throughout your career. Unlike running, where we are going to slow down as we age, we don’t have to get worse at writing.
There is no limit to how good we can become as writers. No one has reached the pinnacle of writing, and no publication has set a bar so high that no writer could conceivably reach it. We need these lit mags, not because they give us more places to publish our stuff, but because they give us more reason to create and more opportunity to read that which others have created. There may be plenty of inferior publications out there, but the literary community is stronger than ever today because of the many opportunities made available by the lit mag boom.
BIO: Nathaniel Tower is the managing and founding editor of Bartleby Snopes Literary Magazine and Press. His short fiction has appeared in over 200 online and print publications. In 2014, Martian Lit released his first short story collection, Nagging Wives, Foolish Husbands. He is a former high school English teacher and the former world record holder for the fastest mile running backwards while juggling. He currently lives in Minneapolis with his wife and daughter. Visit him at nathanieltower.wordpress.com.
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