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Ploughshares is the award-winning non-profit literary magazine based at Emerson College in Boston. Most of our print issues are guest-edited, and our mission is to present varying viewpoints. Our blog is an extension of our print publication, and so we feature writing from guest-bloggers. We present their opinions to our readers in order to foster a lively discussion, but do not necessarily endorse all viewpoints published on our blog.
Comments: We moderate all comments on this blog, both to prevent spammers and keep the conversation civil. Comments will be published whether they agree or disagree with the post, as long as they are expressed respectfully and without personally attacking the author or other commenters.
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Monthly Archives: May 2012
Why I’m Not On Twitter Yet
Last fall, when I sold my debut story collection to Grove/Atlantic, a smart friend whose book had just come out (and was doing extraordinarily well) wrote to encourage me to get on Twitter, stat. He said it was far and … Continue reading
Interview with Tracy K. Smith – “Poets are Lucky”
I met Tracy K. Smith a couple of weeks before she won the Pulitzer Prize for her terrific and completely ravishing new book, Life on Mars. We were at a book party for Stephen Motika and his lovely new book, … Continue reading
Hearing Voices: Women Versing Life presents Wendy Mnookin & Daughters Writing Grief
I first heard Wendy Mnookin read her work during AWP, and later I discovered our odd, unfortunate commonality: Both of our fathers were killed in car accidents. The circumstances differ greatly, but the impulse to write about death, to look … Continue reading
Gatekeepers Part Four-point-Two: in defense of “telling” and sentimental preachiness
Two winters ago, brand-new to the creative writing community of Madison, Wisconsin, I was at ground zero of the national debate on union rights, caught in a throng of 70,000 protestors marching around the State Capitol, screaming “Whose Streets? Our … Continue reading
Posted in Guest Bloggers
Tagged Ai, Allen Ginsberg, Campbell McGrath, Carolyn Forché, cliche, didacticism, don't tell, Flannery O'Connor, Franz Kafka, Garcia-Marquez, Gwendolyn Brooks, Hejinian, Jesse Jackson, Joyce, Langston Hughes, Madison Wisconsin, Mark Doty, Nick Flynn, Pinsky, Rukeyser, Sean Bishop, sensationalism, sentimentality, show, Silliman, Stein, the late great Adrienne Rich, Yeats, Zukofsky
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Dear Dr. Poetry
Darkroom Jazzy Danziger University of Wisconsin Press, March 2012 72 pages $16.95 Dear Dr. Poetry, I’m a mime currently looking to transition into set design, but I keep losing jobs because my sketches are just blank pages. I have no … Continue reading
Literary Boroughs #3: Omaha, NE
The Literary Boroughs series will explore little-known and well-known literary communities across the country and world and show that while literary culture can exist online without regard to geographic location, it also continues to thrive locally. The series will run on our blog from May … Continue reading
Posted in Literary Boroughs
Tagged Alexander Payne, Allison Hedge-Coke, Art Homer, Benjamin Graber, Blue Line, Brent Spencer, Burntdistrict, Caffeine Dreams, Cheryl Strayed, Chris Ware, College World Series, Conor Oberst, Creighton University, Dan Chaon, David Phillip Mullins, Fine Lines, Greg Kosmicki, Herman Cain, Jack Kerouac, Jackson Street Booksellers, Jake's Cigars, Jonis Agee, Joy Castro, KANEKO-UNO Library, Katie Wudel, Kim Louise, La Buvette, Lisa Sandlin, Literary Boroughs, Mary Helen Stefaniak, Matt Mason, Michael Rips, Miles Waggener, Natasha Kessler, Nebraska, Nebraska Arts Council, Omaha, Omaha Creative Institute, Omaha Lit Fest, Omaha Public Library, Omaha Steaks, PS Collective, Rachel Shukert, Richard Dooling, Richard Duggin, Rogue Faculty Press, Ron Hansen, Saddle Creek Records, Sarah McKinstry-Brown, Seven Doctor's Project, Side Door Lounge, Slowdown, Sparkwheel Press, Steve Langan, Strange Machine, Susan Aizenberg, Terese Svoboda, The Antiquarium, The Bookworm, The Nebraska Writer's Collective, the oracle of Omaha, the Wild Kingdom, Timothy Schaffert, Todd Robinson, University of Nebraska-Omaha Writer's Workshop, Warren Buffett, Wendy Townley
15 Comments
First Drafts: Poetry
A Conversation With Traci Brimhall, Amy Gerstler, Andrew Hudgins, and Timothy Liu 1. How do your poems come to you? Traci Brimhall: They rarely come to me. Usually I have to go find them. They’re a bit wily like that … Continue reading
Posted in Guest Bloggers
Tagged Amy Gerstler, Andrew Hudgins, First Drafts, Jamie Quatro, poetry, Timothy Liu, Traci Brimhall
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People Are Funny
This is old news, but in 2005, the Poetry Foundation gave the poet Billy Collins something called the Mark Twain Poetry Award of $25,000, “recognizing a poet’s contribution to humor in American poetry.” The press release included these two sentences: … Continue reading
Literary Boroughs #2: Portsmouth, NH
The Literary Boroughs series will explore little-known and well-known literary communities across the country and world and show that while literary culture can exist online without regard to geographic location, it also continues to thrive locally. The series will run on our blog from May … Continue reading
Gatekeepers Part Four-point-One: on why the [red] pen is mightier than the sword (and other politically useful clichés)
Nearly ten years ago, when I was a twenty-year-old baby-poet with a sense of self-importance even more inflated than it is today, I organized a “Poetry in Protest” reading in Amherst, Massachusetts to demonstrate against what became, a couple months … Continue reading
