The Write Place at the Write Time

***[UPDATED] IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: MILESTONE ANNIVERSARY ISSUE SCHEDULED TO BE RELEASED IN LATE SUMMER WITH REMINDERS, UPDATES TO BE POSTED

Our very first issue, featuring interviews with Janet Fitch (White Oleander) and Nancy Slonim Aronie (Writing from the Heart), debuted on July 3rd, 2008. Over the course of this past decade+, we’ve published 34 issues, featured over 370 contributing writers, over 50 interviews, and over 44 fine artists and photographers.

Arriving at our milestone anniversary afforded us the opportunity to come to a number of crossroads in personal and professional spheres. Our worlds were changing, but so too was the world around us and we had no idea what the future was going to look like. What was certain was that things couldn't stay the same. We had our sights focused on putting out the new issue in the late autumn, but first, technology powers-that-be, affecting millions around the world were introducing change. Rather than stay complacent or at one point or another face aesthetic limitations, we cradled this reality of a dream and went above and beyond to foster its next incarnation. Rather than resist change, we embraced and embodied it with our focus redirected toward the future. We went for so many things new, latest, greatest, elevated. We are still learning the curves but are so excited to share with you new design, new content, and so much more. However, it will still come with the quality and love you have come to know and put your faith in. We never take lightly your importance. We are working on wonderful things and wish to continue to be worthy of you and keep striving to go beyond expectation. Thus, our focus in those months shifted and we are working toward a stunning milestone that is also a rebirth of sorts.

It was also within that time frame that a clould loomed over our family in the shape of an atypical cell. Our assistant editor, my vibrant, gracious, brilliant mother, was exhibiting symptoms that told us something was quite amiss. It was the beginning of our journey then and it became a quest we could not have imagined to coordinate cancer care in the midst of a pandemic. We intend to share our experiences and stories with you soon, but until we do, we are pleased to share that my mother is now recovering from her surgery. How we have navigated these months, how we are getting through these times sheltering in place together as I read to her at night from the new book of one of our NYT best-seller interviewees, has a lot to do with love and humor. Every detail of our lives, every leaf I see in bloom outside as I prepare a meal, makes me grateful and humbled. We are putting up this page and limited version of the site until we can release the milestone issue in a beautiful new incarnation of WPWT. 

We hope to write to you soon via blog and e-mail, and we continue to thank you for your patience and encourage you to check our social media (FB page) for updates. On a more universal note, we hope to have some plans to make this difficult global struggle just slightly easier to weather, slightly more unifying. Stay safe, hold your loved ones dear, and never forget how much we love you and that you always have a place here in the write place at the write time.

The current intended target release date of the anniversary issue falls within the summer season. As we get closer, coordinating with contributors and special components, we will be able to give specifics on dates SO PLEASE check our Facebook page for any updates. Again, this is a limited version of our site (FICTION, POETRY, NON-FICTION and more are behind-the-scenes to give a sparse, neat workspace during our labors of literary innovation) as we work on our future incarnation. Until then, we will have exciting features, postings, activities, and more through our associated blog (scroll to see side tab) and social media. On Facebook we will be featuring information on these items as well as reminders and links to interim content. The text below represents earlier discussion about our decade milestone and the power of art. We also have the text from the last issue down below. See you soon, my loves.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/The-Write-Place-at-the-Write-Time-literary-journal-345104540254/

We can't talk about our magazine's anniversary without thinking of freedom (beyond the immense creative freedoms it has afforded all of us in this literary community, it is USA-based and began the day before the Fourth of July). Finally having arrived at this decade+ milestone anniversary, we can't talk about freedom without thinking of the power of art. What has art done? What have we as creators and receivers of art been able to do? How have we embraced the freedom to be ourselves and express, share, recognize the very things in the cores of our souls? How many countries, cultures, age groups, have been contributors, readers in what we call a family more than a publication? And we can't talk about the power of art without expanding it far beyond our humble publication and looking at art’s ability over time out there in the world to heal, to unite, to effect change, to inspire, to comfort, to give voice, to provide essential perspectives perhaps otherwise unseen.

What we would like to do with this milestone anniversary is celebrate not only this magazine's story, its memories, and the many great individuals (readers, writers, artists, interviewees...) involved, but to also pay homage to the power and freedom in art. This is a time when it is most vital to remember what these things mean and how, as human beings, we have inherent responsibilities relating to them. It is how we reach each other, it is how we know who we are. Those who read, those who view artwork, those who write, those who create artwork, all serve as mirrors. In forming universal understandings, we allow one another to be seen. We recognize ourselves. We are able to glimpse what the world looks like through someone else's frame and what we often find is that objects (or things we once perceived objectively) are closer than they appear.

May we use our freedoms in creating and receiving art with grace, strength, and reverent compassion. May we use the great positive power of art to keep reaching out, to keep forging a global sphere where every living being, every living thing is appreciated. Art is also life—nature, animals, people—all around us and it is both a freedom and responsibility to honor it.

Celebrate your role in this magazine family. As a family of creative, empathetic, kindred spirits, we all have much to say and much work to do.

The winter-spring issue Home page and certain components are left live though we are featuring as stated above, a limited version of the site temporarily as we work on the new issue. We encourage you, especially as it is our anniversary, to peruse the archives and hunt for gems that will nourish, sustain, and encourage you. With diverse content from hundreds of writers, imagery from 40+ fine artists and photographers, and over fifty interviews with fine, famed minds, you are sure to discover or rediscover something essential, something you needed to find in the write place at the write time.

More details on submission themes will be provided on our Facebook page and through community updates.

The Winter–Spring Issue

This is the first issue of the year that marks a decade of our being in existence, and yet in it, we are newly born. We're looking back down the road at the many miles we've traversed, and yet we're standing at a beginning. For all we thought we knew, it wasn't until the final touches that we could grasp the mysteries of this issue. Its assembly was like that of no other before it. We've discussed how the magazine thinks and feels and speaks for itself, but even though we would yield to its directions or imparted messages, we thought (foolishly) we somehow had it down, finally worked out after all these years. Well. As an incontrovertible force, it can tender a hard sort of humility—but never without heart.

We thought we had its "magic" more or less figured, though we were continually awed by it. Then, in its milestone year, it suddenly proved elusive—at worst, with many things out of alignment, we feared it absent. Was it what was happening in our worlds, in those of the contributors and readers we cherish most, in the world at large, that was inhibiting the reception or sight of that unearthly, unnamed guiding quality that had always been present? Where was the serendipitous sorting that would take place each time, as certain and dependable as a sunrise? It was time to go on stage, the curtain was rising, and it seemed that in this crucial hour of a momentous year, the lead, the star, the essence had somehow gone missing. Although there was indeed a bit of theater and perhaps more dramatic moments than we might have chosen to write in, the ultimate performance did not disappoint.

Our accumulated knowledge and experience, our beliefs, our understandings, our demands, were not going to deliver this issue. Wiped clean of all that, our faith would be tried, our certainties reshaped—the issue was, in fact, delivering us. We were enlightened about our approach to it, to life, to creating. One constant through these months was our loving dedication to the publication and to all of you. Holding fast to that dedication, we could let this issue move along through us instead of being moved along by us. It not only paved the way for great things to come later in the year, but it turned out to be one of if not the most, unified issues. We don't need an overview addressing its different pages and components because there is incredible synergy.

In speaking of survival, there are three l's that weave their way through the fiction, poetry, and non-fiction—coping with loss, transforming loneliness, and both the strain and salvation of love. Another shared theme? The mention and use of birds as messengers. How fitting when our logo is the dove. The entire magazine grew from the seed of that painting featured on our Home page. So we go back to the beginning this spring. We came to realize that the essence and "magic" of the magazine never departed for a moment. Hidden, it was there working stronger. It was simply taking us from veterans to novices to teach us, forcing us to trudge forward through uncertainty and obstacles with blind faith, harnessing only our dedication, and then, to rebuild and start fresh. Isn't much of that survival?

We're reminded of a photo we'd taken years ago of an iris coming up through the snow and ice. Survival is often talked about as a precursor or a baseline, but what this issue articulates is that survival can be a complete, dynamic, and beautiful thing unto itself.

Welcome to the winter-spring issue.

Highlights:

We will soon be preparing for our decade anniversary this summer and with this very special milestone that carries not only the significance of what's transpired here but all the stories and bonds beyond the pages that we've shared with you, we intend to celebrate in the same way we started—together. We'd love to hear your words about what you've enjoyed about the publication, what you feel makes it unique, what has affected you, and what anecdotes or memories you'd like to share about WPWT. Updates regarding our publication schedule will appear both here and on social media (see below). Community reminders and information will be sent out accordingly.

We have a Writers' Craft Box which is a section dedicated to giving writers tools, essays, features, and contests to enter. Think of it as an arts and crafts box full of colors and inspiration, or an old toy chest discovered in the attic on a rainy day... In this edition of Writers' Craft Box, we have the results of the autumn-winter Writers' Challenge with winner, Adrienne Corey and her poem. The prize was a donation from us in the winner's name to hurricane relief efforts.

We have an Archives page where readers and writers can trace our artistic journey from the beginning and re-read the philosophies of past interview subjects, including Janet Fitch, Alice Hoffman, Erica Bauermeister, Tracy Chevalier, Dennis Lehane, Joanne Harris, Frances Mayes, Arthur Golden, Jodi Picoult, Mona Simpson, and many, many more!

We also have the Scrapbook page which celebrates the magazine community with commentary from our contributors for each year and also has a list of countries we've reached. *Read reflections on last year's anniversary!

Please send in new announcements to appear in the next issue by June 1st for the Announcements page. Please send your announcements separately from submission content and indicate the intention to have your news included on the Announcements page in the subject line. We encourage all contributing writers and artists to tell us of their news. We love to support our WPWT veterans as they accomplish great things on their creative paths. We wish to showcase the amazing diversity of activity that takes place amongst the members of our magazine realm, and we also like to give news of our publication to our readership. Announcements can be sent to our submissions e-address.

We have a presence on Facebook via our fan page which offers insights, quotes, tools, resources and updates. Visit Facebook.com and stop by The-Write-Place-at-the-Write-Time-literary-journal page. Follow our Twitter account through @WriteplcWritetm. ***You can also join our e-mail list by providing your e-mail address along with the words "ADD ME" through our feedback form on the Feedback and Questions page.

Inscribing Industry is our associated blog, featuring exercises, articles, book giveaways, special features, reviews, and interviews. *We have recent special features and will be putting up further content in the coming weeks and months so be sure to stay tuned! Click on the Inscribing Industry tab to go there directly or visit:
http://inscribingindustry.blogspot.com and become a follower!

We are a triannual publication (published three times a year), established in July of 2008. We are listed on the Poets & Writers site (www.pw.org) under literary magazines. Clicking on our listing describes our publication, past issues, and our editorial focus. We are also listed on Newpages.com, EWR, Duotrope Digest, Agentquery.com, P&E and The Review Review. To read more about our philosophies and approach, you can read the interview of our Editor-in-Chief in The Review Review:
http://www.thereviewreview.net/interviews/there-blending-culturesgenerations-and-countries

Our next issue will be our decade anniversary issue. Check here for updates. If you have any questions, please write to: questions (at) thewriteplaceatthewritetime (dot) org.