42 Magazine

Celebrating Life with Meaning

Call for Submissions, updated December 8, 2009

We read year-round and we are FAR behind on processing our submissions inbox. If you need a quick response, we're really not the ones to go for right now. We're trying to catch up, but our current estimate is that it won't happen until early 2010.

42 is a print magazine (with no online version) seeking submissions for future editions. The editors invite submissions of articles, poems, and stories that illuminate the themes of a meaningful life, whatever that means to you. The magazine is published four times per year, on a sporadic schedule. The most recent issue, Volume 1, Issue 2, was published in September, 2009. The next issue will go to print in December, 2009.

Our thematic focus -- if indeed something so diffuse can even be called a focus -- is on:

Peace :: Justice :: Ecology :: Economy :: Self-reliance :: Simplicity :: Reason :: Joy :: Love :: Art

See below for details of what we are looking for, but don't be constrained by any lack of imagination on our part -- send us your work and give us a chance to love it.

Please note: 42 accepts submissions via email only. Submission address is submission@42magazine.com. Please include the word "submission" somewhere in the subject line to bypass our spam filters. Simultaneous submissions and previously published work are fine. There is no limit on the number of items you may submit, but please submit separate genres (e.g. poetry and fiction) separately. All rights revert to the author/artist. Please submit your written work in the body of your email; submissions sent as attachments will be deleted unread. Our response time is currently up to several months; we're working on shortening that.

Yes, this is a paying market. Yes, we plan to be picky. Yes, we also plan to encourage new and emerging writers and artists. We're all about the Yes around here.

We pay on publication, and Duotrope calls most of our rates "semi-pro".

What we're looking for in general are articles, poems, stories, and art that express how you are increasing the level of meaning and meaningful interaction in your life, and in the lives of others. Alternatively, tell us how you find meaning in your life, work, and art. There's a LOT of wiggle-room there, and if it's well written, there's almost nothing we won't consider. (If you want to see stuff we're NOT interested in, please scroll all the way to the bottom, where the negative thoughts hang out.) That said, here are some decent guidelines for the kinds of things we're hoping to see.

ARTICLES:

We need articles about the things that add meaning to your life. As you can guess, this will cover a broad range of topics, from self-sufficiency to meaningful work, from meditation to slow food, from political activism to personal relationships, from science to arts and crafts. (Note that we are an explicitly Materialistic publication, in the nonreligious sense rather than the acquisitive sense, so we're not interested in pro-spirituality articles.)

If you have a column idea, pitch it. The following columns are already part of our lineup, so don't pitch these particular columns, but give it your best shot:

Crafting on the Cheap: DIY on a shoestring
Upside Downside: Dealing with life, loss, and disability
Down to Earth: Gardening as a social and political "force of nature"

COLUMN FODDER:

Questions and requests for DIY/Crafting column; Questions and tips for Gardening column.

FICTION:

Let your truth shine out of your fiction, if you want, or just spin us a good yarn. We'd like to see short or serialized fiction in any format, on any topic. We'll be especially happy with literature whose theme meshes with our own, but we're really seeking quality here. There's no length minimum or maximum, but longer fiction should be able to be broken up into natural chunks for serialization.

LITERATE EROTICA / WRITERLY PORN / SMUT FOR SMART PEOPLE:

We want your sex. Um, that is, we want your literate porn. If it uses the words "throbbing member" unironically, it's probably not for us. This is a queer/LGTB/trans*/alternative-friendly publication.

POETRY:

We will consider any and all poems you want to send, because poetry is one of the meaningful things in our own lives. Regardless of content or genre, we will, frankly, publish the ones we find to be the best in terms of quality. Formal poetry, free verse, experimental poems, light verse -- we're happy to consider it all. Please submit up to ten poems per submission; there are no length or form limits.

ART:

We need your best original, black-and-white art in high-resolution digital format, with clear captions. We're also hoping for a comic strip or two, if that's what floats your boat. If you cannot point us to a copy of your art online, you MUST write and get our okay before sending it as an attachment. It's easy: just send us an email and let us know about your work before sending it in as a submission; we don't open attachments we're not expecting, because, well, duh.

MUSIC, SPOKEN WORD, MULTIMEDIA:

We are planning to offer a CD to accompany our summer issues. If you have sound or video files you want to submit, please send us an email and let us know about your work before sending it in as a submission; once again, we don't open attachments we're not expecting.

ILLUSTRATIONS:

If you are an illustrator and work well on deadline with a two-week-or-so turnaround, and would be willing to illustrate one or more of our stories, let us know. We need your illustrations to be in black and white (our second choice is grayscale; do NOT submit color illustrations at this time. The only color art we print is our cover.), submitted in high-resolution digital format.

BOOK & MEDIA REVIEWS:

We welcome short (300-1,000-word) reviews of recent books, music, cinema and other forms of media. Your review should give readers a clear sense of what to expect from the work and provide a brief critical appraisal of its merits. Don't dumb it down, don't make it dull. Priority will be given to reviews of things accurately described with any of the following adjectives: small-press, independent/indie, home-grown, DIY, etc. Book and media reviews must not be simply factual; we're looking for high-quality prose. If you can make us laugh, even better.

PRODUCT REVIEWS:

Now, we'll tell you this up front: we are not impressed by consumerism. We're of the mind that having more stuff is not a reliable path to creating a meaningful life. That said, there's some stuff out there that's better than other stuff, and some of the stuff (a good disaster kit, for instance, or a sewing machine that's user-serviceable, or an electric car) can contribute to making life simpler, better, and more meaningful. If you've found some stuff like that, let us know! As with media reviews, product reviews must not be simply factual; we're looking for high-quality prose. If you can make us laugh, even better.

WHAT WE DON'T WANT TO SEE:

Religious matter: We believe deeply in the ability of humans to create meaning in themselves and in the world without the help of gods or religions. We're not interested in publishing articles, poems, or stories that reinforce the idea that these things are necessary in a meaningful life. Also, if you're one of the handful of people who write us every week telling us that it's possible to find meaning in God, or that your particular religious writing is something we should look at because it's different, please save us both a lot of time -- we KNOW it's possible to find meaning in religion, and we'll read your religious work if you insist, but unless it knocks us on our asses from a literary standpoint (see "Tracks East, Tracks West" in issue 1, for example), we're just not interested.
Explicitly pornographic images: We're so happy to print articles about sex and sexuality you can't even believe it. That said, we're not going to jump through the hoops necessary for publishers of photographic porn and such, so keep that in mind when you submit your artwork.
Diet talk, tips on losing weight, or anything that states or implies that bodies of any size are inherently ugly or distasteful.
The tragic stereotype: If your fat chick never has sex; if your lesbian dies a horrible death in the end; if the only way your character with a disability can get laid is to wheedle or pay for it; if your woman really can only find fulfillment on the arm of her man; please spare us. We're not saying your art mightn't have a place somewhere. This just isn't the place.

Peace :: Justice :: Ecology :: Economy :: Self-reliance :: Simplicity :: Reason :: Joy :: Love :: Art