Posts by Karen Gisonny

The Periodicals Division has been collecting alternative press publications pretty much since the Library opened its doors in 1911. The alternative press, a general term that includes small, independent and underground presses, documents social, political and literary movements, popular and not so popular causes, and issues that are often neglected by mainstream media. Collecting and  preserving this material is at the core of the Library's mission to build diverse collections and provide free and open access to them.

Fall into zines and head over to Pete's Mini Zinefest this Sunday, September 25, from 2 to 7 p.m. — you'll help support the Library too! I recently met Andria Alefhi, an organizer of the zinefest event, when NYPL added her wonderful zine, We'll Never Have Paris, to the its landmark zine collection. I was so moved when Alefhi told me her idea to donate part of the zinefest proceeds to NYPL. 

The Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism was established in 1987, through a gift from Joseph Frank Bernstein to the New York Public Library, in honor of journalist Helen Bernstein (now Helen Bernstein Fealy). The gift was in two parts and the idea was to focus on Helen’s love and appreciation of the crucial role that journalism and newspapers play in our society by establishing the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism and endowing the position Helen Bernstein Librarian for Periodicals & Journals (my job!).  Helen continues to be a working journalist today writing for the Palm Beach Daily News where she 

Poetry and Thought with Fence Magazine

I'm really excited about the program for Periodically Speaking: Focus on Poetry tonight. The featured journal is Fence magazine and poetry editor Katy Lederer will be joined by poets Rodrigo Toscano, Gary Heidt, Ken Chen and Sarah Gambito for an in depth discussion of content, as distinct from form, in contemporary poetry.  The program begins with brief readings by the poets followed by conversation.

In 2002, we had our first public program in the DeWitt Wallace Periodical Room, it was a collaboration with CLMP (Council of Literary Magazines & Presses) called “the Magathon”. The Library and CLMP shared the same goal, to support and celebrate literary magazines and what better place to hold the event then a beautiful public space, that collected and housed a vast collection of contemporary literary magazines.

"The Poet as critic" is the topic for the next Periodically Speaking: Focus on Poetry event and we'll appropriately be featuring the Mineapolis-based journal Rain Taxi. Rain Taxi is an eclectic, thoughtful publication, filled to the brim four times a year with literary criticism, interviews and reviews of poetry, non fiction & graphic novels. Although it covers the spectrum of American publishing at its heart are small presses and innovative publishing.

NYPL and CLMP will kick off a new season of Periodically Speaking next Tuesday with a new format and we hope you'll join us.  It's been 5 years since we began Periodically Speaking, and to celebrate we'll be launching something different for 2010.  It'll be one journal, an editor and several poets in brief readings and discussions.  The original ideas behind PS are the same; showcasing the Library's great literary magazine collection in the DeWitt Wallace Periodical Room and providing an opportunity for emerging writers to present their work.

Want to know when a journal’s first issue was published? What that issue # 1 looked like? Need to track down the editor for those impossible to find back issues? Discover what new titles are missing from the collection?

Premiere Issues: An Archive of Magazine Firsts answers these questions and many more that persistently plague serials librarians. The site’s mission “to provide a home for those first issues to live, be read and shared by an international audience,” was begun in 2002 by Danielle Huthart and is a growing collection of 200 or so issues. Included are the often beautiful covers (Huthart’s concentration is art, fashion, design, and 

What better way to kick off your election night then an evening in the DeWitt Wallace Periodical Room – relax, listen to great new writers introduced by their editors, join us for a glass of wine afterward, all still with plenty of time to catch the election results. The line up begins with Editor Thaddeus Rutkowski (Many Mountains Moving) introducing fiction writer Jon Swan, followed by Levi Rubeck (Washington Square) introducing poet Elisa Gabbert and wrapping up with Michael Vazquez (Bidoun) introducing non fiction writer Anand Balakrishnan. Periodically Speaking showcases NYPL’s great collection of contemporary literary magazines. Lots of librarians have worked on 

Literary magazine aficionados, myself included, will meet up in the DeWitt Wallace Periodical Room at HSSL as Periodically Speaking returns on Tuesday, October 14th. It’s a thrill to begin our 4th season hosting the series, which aims to connect editors, writers, readers, librarians, and lovers of literature & lit mags with each other, and the Library’s one-of-a-kind collection. Each evening highlights three periodicals, with editors of each introducing an emerging writer. The cool thing to me about Periodically Speaking is that not only do you get to hear some wonderful new literary voices and editor’s talk about their journals (which I love!) but that it