The Brooklyn Review is a literary magazine founded by Allen Ginsberg and John Ashbery. Award-winning stories have appeared in our pages (honors have included the PEN / Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize) and our published poetry has been anthologized in the Best American Poetry.
The magazine has a long history of publishing emerging writers; we can’t wait to read your work!
Before submitting, please be sure to read the below guidelines carefully and take time to familiarize yourself with the kind of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and art we publish.
General Guidelines
The Brooklyn Review accepts submissions (up to our submission cap of 250) during our two annual reading periods: February 1 - 28th and September 1 – 30th.
We accept only previously unpublished submissions, and we do not accept submissions by email; please submit only via our Submittable page. Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but we ask that you notify us right away if a piece is accepted for publication elsewhere. The editorial staff also reserves the right to edit accepted work in collaboration with the author or artist. Work created using generative AI will not be considered for publication. Due to the volume of work we receive we unfortunately cannot provide feedback on declined submissions.
Please only submit once per submission period to each category.
Fees, Rights, and Compensation
The Brooklyn Review relies almost entirely on CUNY resources for its operational budget; the $3 submission fee we charge covers the costs of the Submittable platform. If this presents a financial barrier, we encourage you to get in touch.
Upon acceptance, the author grants The Brooklyn Review first publication rights in its online and/or print platforms. The author retains all copyright to their work, including reprint rights.
Authors included in our print edition will receive two complimentary copies of the issue. While we aren’t yet able to pay our contributors, we hope to change this very soon.
We are looking for previously unpublished poetry that engages creatively and actively with questions of form, structure, language, and sound. We especially welcome submissions of experimental and non-narrative works.
We aim to feature and promote works by BIPOC writers as part of an ongoing effort to decolonize poetry, poetic praxis, and poetics.
Please submit 3-5 poems, totaling no more than 10 pages, formatted in a single document. Please include a short biographical statement in your cover letter totaling no more than 75 words.
Simultaneous submissions are welcome, but please let us know if your work is accepted elsewhere. You can either withdraw the entire submission, or simply notify us of which poems are no longer eligible.
The Brooklyn Review is excited to open a visual arts-only call!
What we’re looking for: between 1 and 5 images that tell a story. Your submissions should have clear cohesive elements related to composition, material, and palette; avoid redundancies; develop an artistic idea, perspective, or argument; and have a sense of sequence, as the art will be featured digitally. For initial review purposes, please submit all of your images in a single PDF. If we move forward with your submission, we will request high-resolution JPEGs.
Submissions will be open from September 1–September 30. You can expect to hear back from us within 3 weeks of submitting. Note: we may place your submission under ‘consideration hold,’ which means we will consider publishing it as an accompaniment to a prose or poetry piece later in the year.
We’re looking for urgent, atmospheric narratives; deeply inhabited characters; formal invention; precision of language; self-aware humor; polished, thoughtful stories.
We generally publish work between 2,000 and 7,000 words. Please review our submission guidelines carefully and send us only your best work.
We’re looking for incisive yet generous reviews, cultural interventions, and essays; inventive, deeply considered personal narratives; erudite pieces that open the heart and mind; formal, narrative, and thought experiments spanning literature, art, politics, philosophy, media, and the self. We generally publish pieces up to 3500 words. Please review our submission guidelines carefully and send us only your best work.