New Madrid Call For Submissions

RPCV Editor Ann Neelon (Senegal 1978-79)  is the author of Easter Vigil, which won both the Anhinga Prize for Poetry and the Returned Peace Corps Volunteer Writers and Readers Award. After over six years of directing the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Murray State University, she just stepped down and is looking forward to having more time to write. She is currently editing an issue of New Madrid journal on the theme of “Imaging Peace.”–JC

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Poet Ann Neelon

NEW MADRID, Winter 2017 Issue:  World Peace

New Madrid, the official journal of the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Murray State University, will dedicate its Winter 2017 issue to the theme of imagining peace.

As George Bernard Shaw has written, “Peace is not only better than war, but infinitely more arduous.” We are looking for work in all literary genres that speaks to this arduousness and that defines peace not just as the absence of war, but as something dynamic in its own right. Potential questions to be addressed include the following:  How do we handle conflict by peaceful means? How do we create a disposition for peace in a complex, increasingly globalized world? What is the relationship between peace and justice? Is there a relationship between seeking peace within and seeking it without? We hope to encourage a variety of angles of approach (spiritual, cultural, political, economic, etc.). .

Possible categories of interest include:  writing by peace activists, and by those working for organizations dedicated to peace and/or conflict studies; writing by diplomats or by others whose professional lives expose them to the dynamic interaction between and among cultures;

writing by or about refugees in any part of the world or about immigration; testimonies about international activism or international crises; travel writing; writing about negotiating, peacemaking and/or the practice of peace; responses to world literature or to world events; and translations of international writers into English. All submissions should be of interest to the general reader.  Please do not submit scholarly articles.

This issue will celebrate a new partnership between Murray State and the Peace Corps that will enable MSU undergraduates to prepare to engage in global service through the Peace Corps Prep Program. Since 1961, more than 220,000 Peace Corps volunteers have served in 150 countries, including numerous MSU alumni and current and retired faculty. MSU is the first academic institution in the state of Kentucky to be approved to offer the Peace Corps Prep program More information about the program is available here: http://www.kyforward.com/murray-state-university-announces-new-program-to-prepare-students-for-peace-corps-service/.

Submissions will be accepted between August 15 and October 15. Please note: we accept online submissions only. All manuscripts must be submitted online, at www.newmadridjournal.org. Please note that we are in process of converting to Submittable, and our former Submission Manager will not be operational at the start of our reading period.

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