Women in Publishing

I listened to this entire interview of Zadie Smith which addresses her newly appointed position as "New Fiction Editor" to Harper's Magazine:

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/2011/feb/02/zadie-smith-books/

I listened with some discomfort due to the obtrusive and pointed interviewer, but the voice of this notable woman - Zadie Smith - is encouraging for me and I'm glad to know she'll be reviewing New Books in Harper's Magazine - one of the only magazines I subscribe to.

I may have not posted this interview, since I'm no Zadie Smith aficionado, except that I just also read another writer's summation of women in publishing by way of another magazine, The New Yorker, which features full-essay length reviews, similar to Harper's. What this article brings forth is primarily how the magazine lacks women in editorial positions and how the disparity is not easy to dismiss:


http://www.bookslut.com/features/2011_02_017200.php


I haven't done a full analysis of the editorial staff of Harper's, so this comment is not to draw comparisons between the two magazines, but instead, I wanted to briefly post these two links for the sake of an interesting dilemma in the world of fiction writing and publishing which is namely - sexism.

Along these lines, it should come as no surprise that I've decided to take an Emily Dickinson class this semester, and I was very interested to discover her ambivalence toward publishing, due to its inherent limitations which include patriarchy and 'contemporary American taste' which a different, though related, dilemma altogether.

(Unfortunately, I felt that the above-mentioned blog-article regarding The New Yorker pandered in both form and content to what is known as 'contemporary American taste'.)

Thankfully, Emily Dickinson transcended both dilemmas in her own way, through private correspondence as a means to make her writing public and by etching freedom behind closed doors - as the story goes.