Worst Publisher in History, Death of the Partisan Review, and More

by
Evan Smith Rakoff
1.10.13

Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today's stories:

GalleyCat reports publishing-related Kickstarter projects raised over fifteen million dollars in 2012, but with a 30 percent success rate.

On the Best American Poetry blog, Don Share recalls his time working at the venerable Partisan Review, which was in operation from 1934 to 2003.

"Curll was rumored (by Henry Fielding among others) to keep a team of hacks confined to a garret, where they churned out a high volume of disreputable and highly disposable texts, like an 18th-century outpost of the Gawker Media empire." Laura Miller reveals the worst publisher in history. (Salon)

A musical parody of erotic bestseller Fifty Shades of Grey is coming to the New York City stage. (Entertainment Weekly)

Meanwhile, Doubleday is releasing the E. L. James trilogy in hardcover on January 29. (GalleyCat)

Dan Chiasson looks at the poetry of David Ferry, who recently won the National Book Award at age eighty-eight. (New Yorker)

The Huffington Post offers advice on composing a succinct agent query letter.

Sterling Lord, the agent who introduced Jack Kerouac to the reading public, has written a memoir entitled Lord of Publishing. (Vanity Fair)