It’s almost here! The spring 2013 issue of The Whirlwind Review!
The review, an online literary journal focusing on the relationship between writing and spirituality (edited by myself) comes out twice a year: in August and February. Yes, it’s a little late this time—when you have an all-volunteer staff that consists mainly of yourself, it’s kinda hard to stay on schedule. But it’s still coming out in February—just very, very late February.
As always, editing the latest issue of the review has been a challenging, thrilling, gratifying, humbling experience. And, as always, it has taught me a lot. Here a just five of the lessons I have learned—and continue to learn—thanks to The Whirlwind Review and the talented writers who submit to it.
1. There are more good writers out there than you can possibly imagine. There are writers who should be famous. Who should be poet laureates. Who should be required reading in high school.
2.There are even more writers who aren’t quite there yet, but who are getting there, are working hard, are learning, showing real promise.
3. People have complex relationships to their writing. Since The Whirlwind Review focuses on how and why people write, on what they bring to their writing and what writing brings into their lives, I get startling and enlightening glimpses of those relationships. Writing can be an angel who visits you in the quiet of the evening. A trickster who plays jokes on you and runs away laughing. A cruel task-master. A strange and beautiful animal. A old wise man who gives you enigmatic messages he won’t decipher. A baby who needs to be fed, nurtured, and held close to your chest. An evil landlord. An irresistibly seductive lover. Or all of the above at the same time.
4. Many writers either don’t read the contributors’ guidelines of the journals they submit to or read them and decide their work is so good it doesn’t matter if it meets the guidelines or not.
5.Otherwise excellent writers don’t always pay very good attention to formatting, punctuation, and even spelling.
6. Many writers are amazingly grateful and humble when you publish their work. Even when you, the editor, feel like you should be the one overflowing with gratitude for the fact that this brilliant, amazing writer was willing to submit their lovingly crafted work to your journal.
7. Being a writer is hard. Of course, we all know that, but as an editor you see it in a different way. You see it because you can tell how much work went into every submission you receive, even the simplest poem. You see it because you know how many worthy works you have to turn away. You see it in the fact that authors are often delighted to be published in your journal, even though it isn’t The Paris Review. You see it because it shows—all that hard work and struggle and beauty and hope—in every piece you read.