The Orphic Review
I have thought a long time about writing this, what to say, where to post this. I don’t think I owe anybody an explanation but I am writing this for myself really. I started “The Orphic Review” in 2018/2019 under the name “Crow of Minerva” as an art blog for emerging women and minority artists. I kept thinking of other artists out there like me, how much I was struggling to have a voice and a space in the art world and how all the art blogs and Instagram accounts kept showing the same artists. Later I opened it up to literary submissions, mainly poetry but we also published some short stories. I feel very privileged to have published the work of many great writers and artists including Ciarán O’Rourke and Adam Ouston. I am proud of all that I achieved with The Orphic Review. However well-intentioned I was, I feel that, at least on the management front, it was a complete personal failure. Struggling with ongoing health difficulties, I struggled single-handedly to publish every single item on the journal. It was a constant and very difficult battle and I often admitted as much on Twitter. My honest admission impacted the reception of the journal. Hence, I only ever imagined it as a small personal project and this was a serious mistake. I was not ambitious for it though I occasionally compared it to other literary magazines which started around the same time and had gained huge popularity and support and felt nothing but crushing disappointment with myself.
From day one, I should have kept separate social media accounts for the journal and each post should have been professionally polished. I was not the right person for this. I made editing mistakes in the journal which I was always quick to correct but nevertheless I found hugely embarrassing. There were formatting errors and technical issues too and I was always so upset that the writers might be disappointed in me and the journal. I had no experience with any of it and it quite obviously showed.
In a desperate attempt to save it and reboot it, I asked three excellent writers I was acquainted with to become co-editors. Weeks later, I was disparaged on Twitter by a vindictive writer whose work I had rejected and a minor Twitter storm ensued. This had a serious impact on my mental health and I closed down the journal with my deepest apologies to my co-editors who were far too kind to me about it all. It was nearly a year later before I was well enough to open it again, this time with only one co-editor, the brilliant Anne Daly, and I am proud of the ensuing issues we published together.
It was my plan to publish two chapbooks a year but perhaps unsurprisingly I failed to secure funding and my plans were never realised. I also had serious doubts about it in terms of what I would be able to manage with my health. I had legal concerns about getting into publishing with zero experience of contracts, for example. I knew nothing of book distribution. I then won the Publishing Ireland Award in 2024 which I believed would be the answer to all my concerns and help me, finally, get Orphic Press off the ground.
All I have been able to think about is the writers. What I owe them, what I could do for them, what they deserved of me as a potential publisher. Every day online, I saw poets devastated at their publishers closing down, failing them in other ways. This has been weighing so heavily on me. I have thought about my health, my own work, my studies and family and how to balance it all.
And so I have come, regrettably, to the conclusion that the dream of the Orphic Press, of my starting a small poetry press, will not come to pass. I cannot do it. I am not able to do it and it feels like a monumental failure. I hope I can make peace with it one day.
When things look up, I will reopen the website so that that people can still enjoy the marvellous work on it. I am deeply grateful to all who have helped me and supported the journal. To all who have trusted me with their work.
I have learned so much not just from running the journal (six years editing experience is not nothing!!!) but from the writers and artists I have worked with.
