Editor Interview: The Globe Review

Raw and real lit & art

There are millions of publications that we look up to and appreciate the mission and activities of, especially those working to uplift marginalized or, in any way, oppressed groups (including, but not limited to, young voices, LGBTQ+ artists, women, creators with disabilities, and writers from marginalized ethnic or social groups), and endorse inclusivity. From this point of view, we particularly admire Rewrite The Stars Review, Blossom Magazine (and Youth4Arts Organization), Polyphony Lit, K'in Literary Journal, verum literary press, Pollux Journal, beestung, The Afterpast Review, The Stirling Review, Bending Genres, Angel Rust, and more. Our editorial team also loves reading The New York Times, The Atlantic, and The Washington Post, but the editor-in-chief's all-time favorite has always been The New Yorker!

We publish a diverse range of writing and visual art, so I am thrilled to be able to respond in both categories! The great figures of the nineteenth century, such as Chekhov, Ibsen, and Gogol in drama; Charlotte Brontë, Edgar Allen Poe, and Oscar Wilde in prose; and Emily Dickinson in poetry, are among my favorite authors. Later works by Sylvia Plath, Virginia Woolf, Allen Ginsberg, Franz Kafka, Albert Camus, and Tennessee Williams are incredibly close to my heart. Among contemporary authors, E. Lockhart, David Sedaris, Ian McEwan, Raphael Bob-Waksberg, Ilya Kaminsky, and Leonard Cohen are the most influential for me. And let's not forget the world of theatre today! The works of Lin Manuel-Miranda, Jonathan Larson, Joseph Stein, and Isobel Lennart all hold a special place in the world of writing for me.
Regarding visual and performance arts, I would say David Hockney, Edward Hopper, Barbara Kruger, Marina Abramovic, Cecily Brown, and Roy Lichtenstein are my absolute favorites.

In addition to trying to create an incredibly diverse and varied literary palette by publishing poetry, micro, short and longer prose, drama, hybrid genres, and visual art without any significant formal constraints, we also place great emphasis on community building. We genuinely believe everyone deserves the opportunity to showcase their talents regardless of background, identity, or affiliation. In this way, The Globe Review will always be a safe space for anyone who wants to share their passion for literature and the arts with the world because what really matters to us is creativity and undeniable talent. We will gladly be home to hitherto hidden life stories, moving poems, and all that is important to our writers.

First of all, read our submission guidelines - there aren't many of them, so we especially appreciate it if you follow them. Second of all, submit the work that best describes you, makes you unique, and stands out. We want to see how You can become the voice of the next generation of artists!

If we are talking about a writing piece, the ideal submission is captivating by its title and first line. It shows something different from the very beginning, containing the author’s true, unique essence. I personally prefer texts that operate with a lot of symbolism and figurative language. Still, considering that many artists find their real voices in different styles and techniques, I can equally enjoy more literal solutions too.
If we are talking about a visual art piece, the ‘rule’ still applies that the most important thing is that the personality and individuality of the creator shine through the work!
In both cases, we think the possibility of multiple layers of interpretation can significantly improve the quality of a submission.

That just because we are a small, independent literary magazine, it only takes a few days to get a response from us. At the magazine, we also make it our mission to give each piece of work the attention and special treatment it deserves, even if it doesn't make it into the final edition. That is why the whole submission process can take a couple of months. We try to provide each and every author and visual artist who graces us with their work some kind of personal comment, insight, or impression from our editorial team because we want everyone to feel that The Globe Review is really more than a magazine to us; it's a cohesive community of artists.

We are very interested in the people who submit to us, so we always read the cover letters we receive with great attention. We try to offer specific opportunities matching artists' needs and profiles and help them get ahead. We are preparing to launch some of our own special prizes, competitions, and deals for artists in the near future, so stay tuned for that!

We always read every submission to the end, but we usually know from the first couple of sentences how much we resonate with the given piece of writing. Nevertheless, we believe that every work is complete when it is read from beginning to end and that every piece of writing deserves to be read in its entirety.

Once we have a certain connection with the piece of writing we are examining, and it doesn't have any significant grammatical or stylistic errors, we can start to look at it more closely. In particular, we look for the elements that make it stand out from the rest - whether it's particularly evocative imagery, beautiful language, or an intriguing structure.

We read submissions all year round with an open heart and an open mind. Once we have collected a sufficient amount of writing and visual art, the planning process begins. That's when we start designing the new issue, keeping in mind everything: color scheme, theme, cover, content, and always trying to sneak in a little something extra to let readers know that The Globe Review isn't just an everyday newspaper!

In general, we are looking for pieces of writing that do not contain major editing, grammatical, or any other major errors. However, we always work together with the authors to fix minor issues, so they have the biggest say in how the final version looks - after all, they are the real owners of the work!

Absolutely! We nominate to the Best of the Net Anthology and hopefully to our own awards and prizes soon!