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Creative woman
I I I"11
III
~
reviews
& re¢ommendotlon~
LITTLE M A G A Z I N E S CRISTINE
1. 2. 3. 4.
C= RC)M
Blue Cloud Quarterly. Creative Woman. Moosehead Review. Parachute.
Blue Cloud Quarterly. 1955--. Q. $2.00. Benedictine Missionaries, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin, SD 57251. ISSN 0006-5064, (Back issues available from UlVII.) Though the Blue Cloud Quarterly also issues a series of poetry chapbooks, most of the 5½ b y 8-inch issues of the Quarterly itself are more like chapbooks than serials. Usually one issue per year contains works by several authors, but the rest devote their contents to one, or at most two authors. Native American verse and themes are emphasized in 20 to 30 pages of short poems, but some non-Native American contributors do occasionally appear. Stories and shorter prose vignettes are also included sometimes, but whether poetry or prose, the fine quality, imagistic content, form and style are oriented toward nature and the cultural ethos of Native Americans. Contributors have included Cal Thunder Hawk, Wendy Rose, Joseph Bruchac, Tony Long Wolf, Jr., Adrian C. Louis, and other well-known and new voices. Contributor notes are included in every issue. The back rather than the front cover shows the magazine title and publishing information; this will be a minor irritation for serials librarians. Some single-author issues have their own titles printed on the front, making confusion and misrouting even more likely. Nicely illustrated with a few simple but tasteful drawings in some issues, the magazine is beautifully printed and is consistently comparable to the better among little magazines. Blue Cloud Quarterly is a true bargain for any library, but should especially be found in any library collecting Native American materials. Andrew Peters 2. Creative Woman. 1977-- . Q. $5.00; $1.50/copy. Governors State University, Park Forest South, IL 60466. Editor: Helen Hughes. Indexed: British Directory of Graphic Art. The suffragist movement and the "second wave" of feminism of recent decades have generated numerous women's magazines. This was particularly true during the women's movement of the 1960s and 1970s which coincided in time and spirit with the self-help and free speech movements. Many small, independent women's magazines have appeared and disappeared over the past 15 years, and feminist publishing continues to grow. Many of the early magazines inspired by the recent women's movement catered to a local and general audience, opened their pages to a full range of topics, and were marked more b y their enthusiasm and sense of newly-found sisterhood than by the sophistication of their contents. Creative Woman, although established in the late 1970s, is a child of that earlier period. Creative Woman publishes fiction, poetry, articles, art, interviews, criticism and reviews, music, resource lists, plays, and letters. Creative works, despite the title's implication, are a relatively small part of the magazine, and
5. San Fernando Poetry Journal. 6. Westbere Review. 7. Wornanspirit.
generally Creative Woman's prose, poetry and artwork are rather amateurish. With regard to non-fiction articles, this magazine, like the more sophisticated and vetera~, Moving Out and Second Wave (see SR 5:4), casts its net widely. Consider the following sample of articles: °'Seagoing Wives of Yankee Whalers: A Nineteenth Century Phenomenon" (3:3), "Breast Cancer Controversy" (1:4), "Images of Black Women in Literature" (1:2), "Women Speak Out in Papua, New Guinea" (2:3), and "Feminism and Patriarchy: Competing Ways of Doing Social Science" (2:4). Recently, Creative Woman has favored the special issue approach, focusing on "Feminist Scholarship: An Intellectual Corrective" (2:3), "Energy in Living Systems" (4:1), and "Women in the Wilderness" (4:4). Material is aimed at general readers, and Creative Woman is more concerned with breadth than depth. For example, June Sochen's "History, Herstory, and the Human Story" in 2:4 is a superficial rehash of familiar a r g u ments which can inform only the as-yet-unenlightened generalist. Found here too are the "how t o " and self help articles, such as "Solar Gingerbread House Recipe" in 4:2. The magazine is not specifically regional, lik~ Northern Woman Journal (see SR 5:4) or Plexus: Sa~ Francisco Bay Area Women's Newspaper, but many of its contributors hail from the Chicago area (Governors State University is located in the south suburbs). Creative Woman is undoubtedly an inspiration to those women associated with it and, like so many early movement magazines, is providing a sense of shared coin munity. While these functions should not be discounted. Creative Woman is not otherwise strong enough to winrant inclusion in any but the most comprehensive worn en's collections. Illinois libraries collecting regional pub lications may find this a reasonable acquisition. Cristine C. Rom 3. Moosehead Review. 1977-- . S--A. $5.00/individuaib: $6.00/institutions; $3.00/copy. Box 169, Ayer's Cliff Quebec JOB IC0, Canada. Editors: Robert Allen, Ilugh Dow, Jan Draper, Stephen Luxton, Mary Wright. Moosehead Review is quality stuff. The brightly coi ored covers are simple and striking; on the inside, Gar~mond type and, occasionally, clean graphics adorn the' cream colored pages. Happily, Moosehead Reviev. ~, printed contents equal the magazine's packaging. Each 50--65 page issue contains poetry, a fiction piece. some translations, articles, and book reviews; the gcm,,.are not segregated, and, as a result, each issue is a cohc. sive whole. Between 10-15 poets appear in each issue,. some are newcomers, some are seasoned writers (sktch a~ Phil Lanthier and Allan Brown), and a few (like Dam_~,,. Abse and Pablo Neruda) are very well-known. Tile tranblations appear in English only but include the originai title and, where appropriate, publication information. The articles are generally coordinated with each issue's
SERIALS REVIEW
JULY/SEPTEMBER 1981
51
III
~
reviews
& re¢ommendotlon~
LITTLE M A G A Z I N E S CRISTINE
1. 2. 3. 4.
C= RC)M
Blue Cloud Quarterly. Creative Woman. Moosehead Review. Parachute.
Blue Cloud Quarterly. 1955--. Q. $2.00. Benedictine Missionaries, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin, SD 57251. ISSN 0006-5064, (Back issues available from UlVII.) Though the Blue Cloud Quarterly also issues a series of poetry chapbooks, most of the 5½ b y 8-inch issues of the Quarterly itself are more like chapbooks than serials. Usually one issue per year contains works by several authors, but the rest devote their contents to one, or at most two authors. Native American verse and themes are emphasized in 20 to 30 pages of short poems, but some non-Native American contributors do occasionally appear. Stories and shorter prose vignettes are also included sometimes, but whether poetry or prose, the fine quality, imagistic content, form and style are oriented toward nature and the cultural ethos of Native Americans. Contributors have included Cal Thunder Hawk, Wendy Rose, Joseph Bruchac, Tony Long Wolf, Jr., Adrian C. Louis, and other well-known and new voices. Contributor notes are included in every issue. The back rather than the front cover shows the magazine title and publishing information; this will be a minor irritation for serials librarians. Some single-author issues have their own titles printed on the front, making confusion and misrouting even more likely. Nicely illustrated with a few simple but tasteful drawings in some issues, the magazine is beautifully printed and is consistently comparable to the better among little magazines. Blue Cloud Quarterly is a true bargain for any library, but should especially be found in any library collecting Native American materials. Andrew Peters 2. Creative Woman. 1977-- . Q. $5.00; $1.50/copy. Governors State University, Park Forest South, IL 60466. Editor: Helen Hughes. Indexed: British Directory of Graphic Art. The suffragist movement and the "second wave" of feminism of recent decades have generated numerous women's magazines. This was particularly true during the women's movement of the 1960s and 1970s which coincided in time and spirit with the self-help and free speech movements. Many small, independent women's magazines have appeared and disappeared over the past 15 years, and feminist publishing continues to grow. Many of the early magazines inspired by the recent women's movement catered to a local and general audience, opened their pages to a full range of topics, and were marked more b y their enthusiasm and sense of newly-found sisterhood than by the sophistication of their contents. Creative Woman, although established in the late 1970s, is a child of that earlier period. Creative Woman publishes fiction, poetry, articles, art, interviews, criticism and reviews, music, resource lists, plays, and letters. Creative works, despite the title's implication, are a relatively small part of the magazine, and
5. San Fernando Poetry Journal. 6. Westbere Review. 7. Wornanspirit.
generally Creative Woman's prose, poetry and artwork are rather amateurish. With regard to non-fiction articles, this magazine, like the more sophisticated and vetera~, Moving Out and Second Wave (see SR 5:4), casts its net widely. Consider the following sample of articles: °'Seagoing Wives of Yankee Whalers: A Nineteenth Century Phenomenon" (3:3), "Breast Cancer Controversy" (1:4), "Images of Black Women in Literature" (1:2), "Women Speak Out in Papua, New Guinea" (2:3), and "Feminism and Patriarchy: Competing Ways of Doing Social Science" (2:4). Recently, Creative Woman has favored the special issue approach, focusing on "Feminist Scholarship: An Intellectual Corrective" (2:3), "Energy in Living Systems" (4:1), and "Women in the Wilderness" (4:4). Material is aimed at general readers, and Creative Woman is more concerned with breadth than depth. For example, June Sochen's "History, Herstory, and the Human Story" in 2:4 is a superficial rehash of familiar a r g u ments which can inform only the as-yet-unenlightened generalist. Found here too are the "how t o " and self help articles, such as "Solar Gingerbread House Recipe" in 4:2. The magazine is not specifically regional, lik~ Northern Woman Journal (see SR 5:4) or Plexus: Sa~ Francisco Bay Area Women's Newspaper, but many of its contributors hail from the Chicago area (Governors State University is located in the south suburbs). Creative Woman is undoubtedly an inspiration to those women associated with it and, like so many early movement magazines, is providing a sense of shared coin munity. While these functions should not be discounted. Creative Woman is not otherwise strong enough to winrant inclusion in any but the most comprehensive worn en's collections. Illinois libraries collecting regional pub lications may find this a reasonable acquisition. Cristine C. Rom 3. Moosehead Review. 1977-- . S--A. $5.00/individuaib: $6.00/institutions; $3.00/copy. Box 169, Ayer's Cliff Quebec JOB IC0, Canada. Editors: Robert Allen, Ilugh Dow, Jan Draper, Stephen Luxton, Mary Wright. Moosehead Review is quality stuff. The brightly coi ored covers are simple and striking; on the inside, Gar~mond type and, occasionally, clean graphics adorn the' cream colored pages. Happily, Moosehead Reviev. ~, printed contents equal the magazine's packaging. Each 50--65 page issue contains poetry, a fiction piece. some translations, articles, and book reviews; the gcm,,.are not segregated, and, as a result, each issue is a cohc. sive whole. Between 10-15 poets appear in each issue,. some are newcomers, some are seasoned writers (sktch a~ Phil Lanthier and Allan Brown), and a few (like Dam_~,,. Abse and Pablo Neruda) are very well-known. Tile tranblations appear in English only but include the originai title and, where appropriate, publication information. The articles are generally coordinated with each issue's
SERIALS REVIEW
JULY/SEPTEMBER 1981
51