Pearl magazine was founded in 1974 by Joan Jobe Smith while she was an undergraduate at California State University, Long Beach. The first two issues (#1 published May 1974, #2 December 1974) were funded by the CSULB Honors Program and distributed gratis. For want of being typeset and different, those issues featured calligraphy by Smith and women only. Established poets Lyn Lifshin, Ann Menebroker, Linda King, and Rochelle Holt were included, as well as many university women poets, most notably Marilyn Johnson, who was not only published for the first time, but would eventually become a co-editor of Pearl.
Pearl is a 96–160 page, perfect-bound magazine featuring poetry, short fiction, and black & white artwork. They sponsor the Pearl Poetry Prize, an annual contest for a full-length book, as well as the Pearl Short Story Prize, an annual fiction contest. Their annual poetry issue contains a 12–15 page section featuring the work of a single poet, and their annual fiction issue features the winner of their short story contest, as well prose poems, "short-shorts," and some of the longer stories submitted to their contest. Submissions are accepted January through June only.
"We're probably the nicest editors you'll ever find," says Joan Jobe Smith at her Craft Talk during UPGs Writer's Festival. So, if you have something, submit it.
Get more information on Pearl, submission guidelines and contests here.
Also, be sure to check out this interview from Verdad magazine with Marilyn Johnson.
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