A Sad Demise
The December issue of Minnesota Literature will be its last. For years this monthly newsletter has given insightful support to writers in our state, reviewing small-press publications that the Twin Cities papers ignore, providing timely news about book events, and much more. Unlike many small-circulation newsletters, Minnesota Literature always arrived on time at the first of the month impeccably edited and printed. Lucy Vilankulu, the editor, deserves our gratitude.
This unfortunate demise should be a cause for reflection. At $15 a year, MN Lit was certainly affordable. Its book news was certainly useful. And yet its circulation remained small. If half the people in the state who claim to be poets had subscribed . . . Oh, well.
But why did we fail to support this project? In Duluth, where I live, the city’s largest newspaper does not stoop to reviewing local writers and does not employ local reviewers. We have a large writing community whose activities were often sited in MN Lit. Could this community have made fund-raising efforts on behalf of MN Lit? How many of us whose works were reviewed in MN Lit made donations to support the publication that supported us?
It’s a shame.
October 30th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Perhaps the personalities that underlie the assertiveness that necessitates successful fund raising and the detached perception of the talented writer cannot reside in the same being. We’d best find each other.