I like the New Yorker (in theory) very much, especially select sections. Still, the percentage I “read” of each issue is meager at best, if I’m being honest. How is it that I have read a ton of their cartoons and poetry and so little else?
It’s not that I don’t enjoy their other pieces on a one-off basis, as interesting self-contained stories that randomly bob in and out of my online voyages. However, surely part of my skimishness of the print issue when I come across it is the print layout, which I find incredibly frustrating and old-school. I’m way too ADHD to read their mag from cover-to-cover, like their layout clearly thinks one should, and the sheer quantity of text (no, not the REAL text…I’m talking about their wordy ads, for goodness sakes, and their general lack of shame in leaving ANY white space) makes their print magazine seem mostly “text on text…next to the text.” My eyes definitely get glazed over when I meet up with the many, many, MANY New York-only cultural events they cover. (Yes, I know it’s call The New Yorker. But with a subscription base all over the country, you’d think they’d move those mostly to the online magazine, under a heading called, “If you live in the following five zip codes” and let the rest of us have a few pages of breathing room, and god forbid, maybe a few nice photographs.)
If you are burned out from literary publications that seem more regional and perhaps overly jam-packed than global and divinely spacious (what is not a literary journal than a place to read and reflect, after all?), let me introduce a new (free) one for you…Cerise Press. I came across this one day when I looked up the name of a former classmate of mine, who wrote amazing poetry, really visually stunning stuff. It was so good when I ran back across one of them while cleaning out some old school papers, I did a quick Google search. (A good reminder, too, that I really ought to knuckle down on my business courses. But that’s another story. Ha!) Turns out she was the Editor of this publication, now sadly defunct (but with lots of good stories, poems, and more to explore all the same through its archive).
Check out Cerise Press online now.
Are there certain publications where the online layout is superior to the print version in your world? Which one(s)?
Life is a bowl full of cerises,
Freckles
