Literary Journals at the Belvedere-Tiburon Library

Literary Journals at the Library

read If you enjoy reading contemporary short stories, poetry, and essays, the Belvedere-Tiburon Library has a treat for you: the largest collection of literary journals in Marin County. The collection consists of fifteen titles, ranging from The Paris Review to Francis Ford Coppola's Zoetrope: All Story.

You can find our literary journals on a free-standing case in the first magazine alcove. Back issues of literary journals circulate for one week and can be checked out at the Circulation Desk.

Below is a list of the titles in the collection, accompanied by a description, a link to the title's entry in our database, and a link to the journal's website.

Granta
Library holdings
Official Web site
"Granta magazine publishes new writing -- fiction, personal history, reportage and inquiring journalism -- four times a year. It also publishes documentary photography. Every issue contains at least 256 pages in paperback book format; special issues, such as those on India, London and (most recently) Australia, can be up to 100 pages more."

Kenyon Review
Library holdings
Official Web site
"The mission of The Kenyon Review is to identify exceptionally talented emerging writers, especially from diverse communities, and publish their work (fiction, poetry, essays, interviews, reviews, etc.) alongside the many distinguished, established writers featured in its pages." The Kenyon Review is published by Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio.

The Mississippi Review
Library holdings
Official Web site
The Mississippi Review offers "new fiction, poetry, essays, and interviews by important young writers." MR is published by The Center for Writers at The University of Southern Mississippi and edited by Frederick Barthelme. Each issue also has a guest editor.

Paris Review
Library holdings
Official Web site
"The Paris Review was founded by Peter Matthiessen and Harold L. Humes in the summer of 1953. The two young writers were dissatisfied with the emphasis on criticism in the literary magazines then being published—the preference for "writing-on-writing" over writing itself—and to address the problem conceived of a new review singularly devoted to original works of fiction and poetry. Matthiessen invited George Plimpton, then a student at Cambridge, to take a position as editor. Plimpton has headed the magazine ever since."

Ploughshares
Library holdings
Official Web site
"Ploughshares was founded in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in the Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Published in April, August, and December in quality paperback, each issue is guest-edited by a prominent writer who explores personal visions, aesthetics, and literary circles."

Zoetrope: All-Story
Library holdings
Official Web site
"In 1997, Francis Ford Coppola launched a magazine devoted to supporting the brightest young voices in fiction. In its short history, Zoetrope: All-Story has received every major short fiction award, including the National Magazine Award for Fiction, while simultaneously discovering authors such as Adam Haslett, Melissa Bank, and David Benioff and publishing literary luminaries such as Gabriel García Márquez, Don DeLillo, and Cynthia Ozick."

Zyzzyva: The Journal of West Coast Writers & Artists
Library holdings
Official Web site
"Little magazines played a key role in the triumph of early modernism. They were emblematic of the new, hotbeds of radical experiment. That was then. Now we confront a culture obsessed with big numbers. Big-time magazines have all but given up on fiction & poetry. ZYZZYVA attacks the new smugness by asserting classical values: the possibilities of individual vision; the enduring magic of words; the delight of variety; absolute freedom from commercial constraint."