Ecotone is a literary journal of place that seeks to publish creative work about the environment and the natural world while avoiding the hushed tones and clichés of much of so-called nature writing. In the natural world an ecotone is a landscape where two separate ecosytems overlap, a place of danger and opportunity for animals. As we try to reimagine a new literature of place, our journal embraces literary ecotones, writing that breaks across genres and seeks out edges. These edges—between science and literature, the urban and rural, the personal and biological—are places that are alive and electric, as well as new and dangerous.

Our journal has come a long way in a short time. In four years we have gone from an idea to a full fledged literary journal ready to publish its fifth issue. Essays and poems have been reprinted and noted in the Pushcart Prize anthology, Best American Essays, Best American Short Stories, Best American Poetry, and Best American Science and Nature Writing. Our contributors have included National Book Award Winners and literary luminaries like Mark Doty, Gerald Stern, Ann Zwinger, Peter Matthiessen, Wendell Berry, Rick Moody, Aimee Bender, and Julianna Baggott. Our striking cover art work, which often features unexpected and startling images from the natural world, seeks out new ground just like the writing we publish, and has featured painters like Joan Snyder, our cover artist for our third issue, who won a MacArthur Fellowship in September of 2007.

Ecotone Journal

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