Published 13 November 201213 November 2012 · Main Posts Subscriberthon 2012: Louise Swinn on discoveries made possible by little journals Louise Swinn We all – all of us in independent publishing – talk about why it’s good to support small presses and sometimes we forget the specifics of why, or it feels like – when there’s Harry Potter on the shelves, or you just feel like a bit of Fifty Shades of Whathaveyou – that it’s like eating your greens, supporting small press. But the main reason I’m in this bag is that small press is the place where a lot of my favourite, those-I-love-to read writers had their start. Karen Hitchcock signed a book deal with Picador but it wasn’t out of nowhere: Karen had had stories published in places like Overland and our Sleepers Almanac. Look at the lists of names getting notice now: Jessica Au, Pierz Newton-John, Laurie Steed, Paddy O’Reilly, Jon Bauer, Daniel Ducrou, Meg Mundell, Leanne Hall, Ryan O’Neill, Ruby Murray, Tony Birch, and on and on and on – people who I first read and loved in books from small publishers, especially journals. The same goes for the now-iconic Aussie writers: there’s nothing like picking up a forty or fifty-year-old copy of Meanjin or Overland to be amazed at the names you’ll recognise. Sneaking long gawks at old copies was one of the highlights of work-experiencing at Meanjin. When people say it’s cheap to subscribe, I always think – it’s all relative, isn’t it? I don’t think anyone should be guilted into anything – just buy them when you can, and know when you set aside the time to read that you might be sitting down to something that could blow your tiny mind. Louise Swinn Louise Swinn is a writer, editor, publisher and reviewer. Her work appears regularly in the Age, the Australian, and the Sydney Morning Herald. Louise was one of the founders of Sleepers Publishing, the Small Press Network, and the Stella Prize. More by Louise Swinn › Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays 28 March 20249 April 2024 · Main Posts Why we should value not only lived experience, but also lived expertise Sukhmani Khorana In the wake of this year’s International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, I want to extend the central idea of El Gibbs’s 2022 essay on 'lived expertise' and argue that in media accounts of racism, analytical expertise and lived experience ought to be valued together and even in the same body. 5 March 2024 · Main Posts Andrew Charlton’s school assignment Alex McKinnon Australia's Pivot to India exists for three reasons: so that when Andrew Charlton is interviewed on the radio or introduced on Q+A, his bio includes the phrase "he has written a book about Indian-Australian relations"; to fend off accusations that he is another Kristina Keneally engaging in electoral colonialism in western Sydney; and to help the Albanese government strengthen economic and military ties with Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party.