William Gass at the Brooklyn Public Library
Notes on a recent reading, and why it pays less to be a brickthrower.

 

Note:

After months of haphazard editorial additions, with a rhyme/reason inscrutable to all five or six of this magazine's readers, it has been decided that from now on the content of 55 will be compiled into numerically designated issues. Therefore, the initial two-month run of by-current-standards prodigious material will be considered Issue One.   As follows, the three artists' portfolio reviews that appeared some time later will make up Issue Two (Winter 2008), which brings us to the second organizational point: the season or seasons (or holiday, week, astronomical or planetary event) that best represent(s) the time of the issue's writing and/or its publication WILL ALSO BE APPLIED.   New issues will be published (compiled) when it is decided that they are ready for the archive. A new issue will not be designated simply because new content is posted to the magazine. Edits, embellishments, comments, and the appearance of additional material will occur continuously with and without announcement. These are the privileges of an electronically produced publication, and this magazine intends to use them accordingly.*

 

*Basically, the editor/writer/publisher does not have the time to envision and produce a schedule (regular or irregular) of complete issues in advance of publication. If this were attempted, no one would get to see the work while it is still (the hope is) relevant. So instead of following the process of a legitimate magazine (or zine, even), 55 is offering a chance for you--or youse --dear readers to watch as rules are bent, thoughts are re-thought, and new content occasionally nudges back the old.   Happy?

 

---April 4, 2008