10-17-08 Week Seven (review of Narrative)

In the online world any site claiming to offer new “quality” prose (for free), deserves immediate suspicion. Why, if this is any good, one wonders, do I not have to pay? Narrative magazine is a non-profit quarterly described as “the leading online publisher of first-rank fiction”(www.Narrative.com). In the magazines first issue, Fall of 2003, the editors and co-founders Carol Edgarian and Tom Jenks write their standard introductory note describing the reasons for Narrative’s creation.
“With Narrative, we hope to offer as transparent a medium as possible to connect readers and writers. We aim to advance no editorial stamp or personality such that anyone might say that a particular work is a “Narrative magazine” sort of piece; rather, our interest is in good writing and narratives that are entertaining, unpredictable, and charged with the shock of recognition that occurs when the human significance of the work is made manifest. We enjoy pieces in which the effects of language, situation, and insight are intense and total.” (Editors Note Narrative 2003)
Narrative is fully aware of the challenges it faces, in what it terms this “age of hypertexts and lowered literacy.” But in a surprisingly optimistic belief, Edgarian and Jenks claim their work is a “wish to signal…the durability of narrative traditions”. Well yes, I would agree with you two there, the narrative is likely to survive Google, but isn’t Perez Hilton’s blog a a narrative tradition? Ah ha, but they have Joyce Carol Oates. The fiction offered up by Narrative is not particularly innovating in style but is quite good and sturdy. The non-fiction they publish is also remarkable; essays by well known writers, like W. H. Auden writing on reading in the Winter 2008 issue.
One of the best perks of being an online journal is having “the space to publish substantially long pieces-not only novellas and excerpts but extensive, works-in progress”, as well as their ability to offer instant access to archives (www.narrative.com) . The magazines overall aesthetic is also notable. Their site is simply nice to look at, with easy to navigate links and pictures of the authors. There is a very unobtrusive quality to their page; everything is displayed simply without fanfare. The San Francisco Chronicle goes father to claim “Narrative is also atypical in terms of quality. There is no whiff of literary hipsterism here, no veil of coolness to cover up the mediocre writing that is often found in new publications by editors who have spent their college years boning up on David Foster Wallace.”
But the lack of a certain style is not a universal opinion, far from it. The site leaves you wondering… yes, it is an amazing feat to publish this much work and give it away to anyone with an email address, but how did they finance such a venture? I have looked for this information extensively and have only found again and again that Narrative is a “non-profit organization”. My interpretation of non-profit, in this case, is Edgarian and Jenks are bored and independently wealthy, which, let me clarify, is not a reason to dismiss or dislike the magazine. But it does put a tint on the utopian ideal of connecting readers and writers. As one very angry blogger commented, “Yes, Jenks and Edgarton, a loving couple, a "symbiotic" match made in yuppieville, took time off from writing their own, "acclaimed" novels and went to Martha's Vineyard to put together their revolutionary website. How revolutionary?” (www.wetasphalt.com). However, no one can deny that if the goal was to offer easy access to good prose and poetry, Narrative has succeeded. I suppose the lesson with Narrative, and others of its type, is a simple one: don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, but don’t give it your email address either, unless you’re ready for some serious spam.
By Gabrielle Reed