Posts Tagged: poetry editor

Inside IR: Meet Poetry Editor Michael Mlekoday

Indiana Review poetry editor Michael Mlekoday believes poetry is “a register of our values and fears. It’s dynamic and purgative. It’s church and sex and  everything in between.” If you ask him about his favorite kind of casserole, he’ll point out that “in Minnesota, we don’t say casserole, we say ‘hotdish,'” and go on to describe his favorite ‘hotdish’ in mouthwatering (?) detail: “I like tater tot hotdish—tater tots, cream of celery soup, frozen veggies, ground beef if you’re into that, and more tater tots.” When asked to predict the future of literary journals—both print and online—he says, “I think we’ll keep making and sharing poems and stories and essays until we’re all dead, one way or another.”

Continue reading to learn more about the poetry-loving, tater-tot eating man behind Indiana Review.

JL: How did you come to love poetry?

MM: Before their great friendship, the poets James Dickey and James Wright exchanged a series of relatively brutal letters attacking each other for things the other had written and published—there was name calling, squabbling, probably quatrains about each other’s moms, etc.

Had my high school English teachers taught that stuff instead of, oh, I don’t even remember, Shakespeare’s sonnets maybe, I might’ve become interested in poetry much earlier. Instead, I wanted to be a rapper.  I memorized and analyzed every single line of my favorite albums—and only later realized that was poetry.

JL: What is the last piece of writing that knocked the wind out of you?

Read more…

Inside IR: Meet the Editors

As you might imagine, Indiana Review‘s poetry editor is a busy, busy woman, but Cate Lycurgus takes a moment to speak in exclamation points and spread a little literary love.

Where are you from?

I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and did my undergraduate degree there. I miss the sun and the ocean and the tart frozen yogurt!

Favorite issue of IR?

33.2 because it’s here! And because it was the first issue that I really remember fighting for poems. There were pieces I felt strongly about, and wanted to see them published.

Fave non-IR journals?

Too many to count! I love Crazyhorse and Pleiades and Hayden’s Ferry. I also can’t get enough of Poetry, and I look forward to it every month. Especially the “Q and A” issue in December. Hearing writers answer questions about craft and about particular poems is such a treat, and I learn more from them than many literature classes and lectures.

What/who is on your reading wishlist right now?

When they come out this spring, Todd Boss’ Pitch and Mike McGriff’s Sequence of the Night. I want to read Kimberly Johnson’s A Metaphorical God, and Juliana Spahr’s Fuck You-Aloha-I Love You. I always want to return to Rilke, to his Duino Elegies. For fiction, The Art of Fielding by Chad Harback, then so much non-fiction: Reza Aslan’s Beyond Fundamentalism, Melissa Coleman’s This Life is in Your Hands, Walter Isaacson’s Benjamin Franklin: An American Life–I want to read that to my dad.

What do you hope to see next for IR?

Previews of poems that will appear in our next issue online and maybe some new online content. While holding a journal comes first in my heart, I appreciate a tasteful website that has inspiring work so I can get a flavor of it through browsing. I want people to see what a stunning journal IR is and to subscribe!