Focus on Fellowships: Brigid Hughes of A Public Space

"If someone is joining A Public Space, we want them to be connected to the history of the magazine, the philosophy and vision for editing. It's also part of the idea of the fellowships to bring in new thoughts, perspectives, experiences. "

LitNYS: Can you talk about the genesis of the fellowships that you offer at A Public Space? What were the goals in starting these fellowships?

BH: We have two fellowship programs at A Public Space. The Writing Fellowships and the Editorial fellowship. The fellowships for writers started in 2014. There were a few ideas behind it.

Debuting writers has always been an important part of the magazine. Jesmyn Ward, Nam Le, Leslie Jamison all published their very first pieces in early issues of A Public Space. Amy Leach, Lauren Redniss, Nora Krug, Sam Stephenson published very early work in the magazine. Those were hugely important experiences—encountering and publishing their work, and also the editorial conversations we had with each of them. As we approached the magazine's tenth anniversary, we started to think about a way to expand that kind of support for early-career writers.

The fellowship program makes two things possible: It highlights our interest in seeing work from writers who are just starting to publish, or who may not yet have published at all. And it creates a space for us to dedicate editorial time and intensive attention to supporting their talent. 

The Writing Fellowships launched in 2014 with a very simple application. The only eligibility requirement is that you haven't published a book. There is no fee to apply. We have a small group of readers who evaluate the submissions—we're looking for work where it feels like the writer is taking a risk, for pieces that feel true to the writer's singular vision. We try to shout from as many rooftops as possible about the program, and to encourage in particular writers who might otherwise not submit to the magazine.

Three writers are selected annually, and the idea is to pair them with an editor at the magazine and provide various opportunities to connect with A Public Space's extended community. The fellowships have supported twenty-seven writers since 2014, so the program has a history now–several fellows are now publishing their first books. Jai Chakrabarti, LaToya Watkins, Gothataone Moeng, Kate Doyle, Deborah Taffa. In 2015, a nineteen-year-old writer from Nigeria named Arinze Ifeakandu was one of our fellows; last year, A Public Space Books published his debut story collection, God's Children Are Little Broken Things. 

And this year, for the first time, the Writing Fellowships are open to poetry as well as fiction and nonfiction. We're always trying to think of ways the Fellowships can connect the magazine with new communities of writers. 

The Editorial Fellowship developed out of an interest in bringing this same kind of support to the talent and imagination of aspiring editors. When A Public Space won the inaugural Whiting Literary Magazine Prize in 2018, the foundation asked us to envision a new program that the prize could help to make possible. It felt fitting to use that prize to launch an Editorial Fellowship that could support the next generation of editors.

The program supports one aspiring editor annually. They join the staff for a nine-month fellowship. As with many nonprofit independent presses, it's a small staff so the fellow really gets to participate in all aspects of our work. They shadow the editors, evaluate submissions, see the process of editing a piece for the magazine and for a book, marketing, publicity, and so on. They also have the opportunity to serve as the lead editor for a portfolio in the magazine.

LitNYS: I like that there is a lot of creative control in the editorial role. Can you talk about the values that went into designing these fellowships? 

BH: Our approach to editing is to try to find what is singular about the writer's talent and about the piece, and then to think about what we can do as editors to support those singular qualities. What is the sentence that only that writer could write? What's the idea they're thinking through in a way that feels new, surprising, and interesting? That's the foundation of all our work at A Public Space. 

LitNYS: What were some of the challenges to getting the fellowships off the ground?

BH: I don't really see them as challenges. We're always thinking about who isn't submitting to the magazine, why they aren't sharing their work, what kind of work we aren't seeing and why, and what we might be able to do to change that. 

With the Editorial Fellowship, I wouldn't say it's a challenge, but in the last few years, with so much of our work done remotely now, how we work, how we interact as a staff has changed, and that's impacted the shape of the fellowship. At the same time we're providing training and mentorship to the fellow, we're also figuring out for ourselves new ways of working. I haven't thought of it as a challenge, but it has added a layer to the fellowship; it's been illuminating for all of us.

LitNYS: What are the most exciting aspects of the fellowships?

BH: Encountering a new idea, a new way of thinking about editing, a new style, a new way of experimenting with language. All of that is thrilling, and in turn resonates in the work we do in all realms of A Public Space.

One year, our Editorial Fellow started just as we were launching a new book-club series, and reading War and Peace with one of our contributing editors, Yiyun Li. Our fellow asked, Why do we revisit history in fiction? That question shaped some of our conversations around Tolstoy's novel, and would go on to influence the portfolio she edited for the magazine. That kind of cross-pollination has been a wonderful aspect of the fellowships. There have been instances like that every year.

LitNYS: It must be pretty exciting to know that you gave Jesmyn Ward a space and Leslie Jamison. They're such prolific writers at this point and it must be kind of nice to know that you were there at the beginning.

BH: What's thrilling is to go back and read Jesmyn Ward's first story, "Cattle Haul," or Leslie Jamison's first story, "Quiet Men," and to see exactly that quality and vision that they're now known for, to see the defining essence of their talent there from the very beginning. I still carry some of the sentences from those early pieces in my mind, and think of them often.

LitNYS: What lessons have you learned along the way in managing successful fellowships?

BH: There's a balance the fellowship is trying to strike. If someone is joining A Public Space, we want them to be connected to the history of the magazine, the philosophy and vision for editing. It's also part of the idea of the fellowships to bring in new thoughts, perspectives, experiences. How do we balance these two things? How do we bridge tradition and evolution? That’s the joy and excitement of our work with the fellowships, thinking through those questions together.