HIGHER ARC NODS TO STONECUTTER

by mieke


Stonecutter: A Journal of Art and Literature

Stonecutter is first off the rank for our new series of ‘Nods’ (rather than ‘Salutes’) for magazines that are alive and kicking!

I met Stonecutter’s editors at the Brooklyn Book Festival in July 2012, and fell for them, so to speak, straight away. I was first introduced to Stonecutter, when Will (HA Associate Editor) bought a copy online. He’d found Stonecutter via the writer Eliot Weinberger, who is a contributor (his daughter Anna Della Subin is an associate editor). I’d been a reader and admirer of Weinberger’s work for a while, and had had a great time when I’d met him at the Melbourne Writer’s Festival in 2011. (Note: his most recent book of essays, Oranges and Peanuts for Sale, is recommended strongly. If you’re interested, he’s also the author of the hilarious and witty slams of Republican nightmares: George Bush Jnr and Mitt Romney, which went viral on the London Review of Books website. But enough about Eliot.)

Stonecutter was founded in 2011 by editor-in-chief Katie Raissian; associate editors Ava Lehrer and Anna Della Subin; art editor Zara Katz and advisory editor Kate Abbey-Lambertz. An honourable mention must also go to Katie’s very charming and talented husband, artist Christopher Russell, who is responsible for the incredible contributor portraits in each issue (below) and these amazing posters. The publication is beautifully printed and very thoughtfully edited, featuring impressive contributions with a very special attention paid to poetry and translation. Editor Katie also writes notes to customers who buy Stonecutter online, a very nice touch, which sums up well Stonecutter’s intimate and warm approach to independent publishing.

To give you a direct taste of what I’m talking about, I quote the first paragraph of Katie’s ‘Letter from the Editor’ from Issue One,
A traveller on a road in 8th century China found a poem carved into a stone. Meditating on his discovery, he found many poems to speak to the mountain. A millennia of voices and experience flooded to him. The stone and word combined. The poet realized his work: his landscape held the key to his poetry. A sharing of humanity in stone.’
Stonecutter, now in it’s third issue, has already published the likes of Christopher Middleton, John Asbury, Sarah Holland-Batt, LK Holt, Tankred Dorst, Stuart Krimko and Lucy Ives.

It is now available at Readings St Kilda; Readings Carlton; The Hill of Content; and Paperback Books. Stock is selling fast so get in quick (or buy online here if you want a note from Katie – who wouldn’t?)

~ Mieke Chew