Noon (Literary Annual)
| Editor | Diane Williams |
|---|---|
| Frequency | Annual |
| Founder | Diane Williams |
| Year founded | 2000 |
| Company | Noon, Inc. |
| Country | United States |
| Based in | New York City |
| Language | English |
| Website |
noonannual |
| ISSN | 1526-8055 |
NOON is a literary annual founded in 2000 by American author Diane Williams. The 15th Anniversary Edition launched March 2014. NOON is archived at The Lilly Library along with the personal literary archive of founding editor Diane Williams. The Lilly is the principal rare books, manuscripts, and special collections repository of Indiana University.
NOON publishes fiction and occasional essays. A full table of contents, including back issues, is available on the NOON website. The magazine has been described as a "beautifully-produced literary journal that features the strongest offbeat writing from a select group of literary stylists."[1] In 2007, Deb Olin Unferth told Bookslut that NOON founder and editor Diane Williams "inspires excellence and demands discipline. More than an editor, she is an editor-artist."[2]
NOON stories have won numerous awards and prizes, including:
- Lincoln Michel's "If It Were Anyone Else' - 2015 Pushcart Prize
- Joanna Ruocco's "If the Man Took" - 2014 Pushcart Prize
- Deb Olin Unferth's "Likable" - 2014 Pushcart Prize, "Pet" - 2010 Pushcart Prize, “Juan the Cell Phone Salesman" - 2005 Pushcart Prize
- Lydia Davis's "We Had Wondered What Animal Might Arrive" - 2009 Pushcart Prize. She was also a 2007 National Book Award Fiction Finalist for her collection of stories Varieties of Disturbance. Seven of those stories appeared in previous editions of NOON.
- Clancy Martin’s “The Best Jeweler” - 2008 Pushcart Prize
- Christine Schutt’s “The Duchess of Albany" - 2007 O. Henry Prize
- Kim Chinquee’s “Formation" - 2007 Pushcart Prize
NOON published first or early stories by Deb Olin Unferth, Clancy Martin and Rebecca Curtis, and regularly publishes Gary Lutz, Lydia Davis, Sam Lipsyte, Tao Lin, Dawn Raffel, Brandon Hobson, Greg Mulcahy, Rob Walsh, Kim Chinquee, and others, giving it a reputation as "easily one of the most innovative literary magazines in America." [3] The journal also publishes original drawings by Raymond Pettibon and Augusta Gross, and photographs by Bill Hayward.
Critical response
The Times Literary Supplement reviewed NOON in its Learned Journals section on October 30, 2009. Alison Kelly wrote, "[T]he best stories in NOON are, indeed, stunning, in the sense that they leave one conscious of powerful meanings not yet fully absorbed. . . . [T]he journal has proved its staying power and achieved a respected position. . . NOON has intellectual weight. Over the years it has investigated, and pushed the boundaries of, the means and processes of communication. . . . Williams's editorial vision ensures the intelligence and integrity of the journal as a whole."
In The New York Sun, Benjamin Lytal called NOON "One of American fiction's finest and most focused journals."[4]
Library Journal wrote that “NOON sets itself apart from the crowded field of literary journals with the quality of its submissions, its clean, easy-to-read design, and eye-catching cover. This independent, not-for-profit annual features essays, fiction, interviews, art, and translation that are as diverse as its contributors, who are both published and previously unpublished and come from international backgrounds. The editors of NOON adeptly select innovative, original, and highly readable work.”[5]
Christopher Frizzelle, editor of The Stranger, wrote "Noon, another literary journal that belongs on the list of literary journals that don't suck. The downside to Noon is that it only comes out once a year. The upshots are that Noon has a serif font, crisp photos, and excellent writing, or at least writing by writers I love."[6]
Time Out New York said "Even if it shares some authors with mainstream publishers, Noon still shimmers with courage, strangeness and unknown voices" and that editor Diane Williams "has a penchant for devout stylists and squirm-inducing topics." [7]
In the Los Angeles Times on March 19, 2013, David Ulin wrote, "The new issue of Noon landed last week, and as usual, it’s a compendium of unlikely pleasures: short prose and illustrations that challenge us to think about meaning and narrative. The brainchild of fiction writer Diane Williams, who edits it, Noon has been around since 2000, publishing a single issue annually; it is elegantly designed and curated, a journal that wears its intentions on its sleeve....These are oblique stories, stories that exist in the interior, getting at the things we know but do not know we know." [8]
In the May/June 2014 issue of Poets & Writers, Travis Kurowski wrote, "NOON contains prose chiseled to its barest, most arresting essence--a concision attributed by most to Williams's high demands as an editor."
See also
References
- ↑ Kevin Sampsell Interview from the Believer, reprinted in New York Tyrant
- ↑ Deb Olin Unferth Interview in Bookslut
- ↑ More Books Blog
- ↑ The New York Sun
- ↑ Library Journal
- ↑ The Stranger
- ↑ Time Out New York
- ↑ The Los Angeles Times