Fall 2018

The Threepenny Review

One of most original literary magazines on the entire planet

The Threepenny Review3 min read
Contributors
Rachel Abramowitz’s poems and reviews appear in The Seneca Review, Crazyhorse, and other publications. She teaches at Barnard College. Megan Baxter is a recent graduate of Vermont College of the Arts. Her first book, The Coolest Monsters, is forthco
The Threepenny Review11 min read
Table Talk
I LOST SIXTY pounds dieting for my bodybuilding contest. Dropping this much weight, I was prone to fainting spells, always at the most inopportune of times. I would stand at the conclusion of work meetings, assuring my boss I was fine—I know what I’m
The Threepenny Review1 min read
A Note On The Artworks
When Arlene Gottfried died in 2017, her New York Times obituary called her “part documentarian, part social worker.” Gottfried’s portraits do often suggest a connection between photographer and subject that endures beyond the frame: a look of trust a
The Threepenny Review14 min read
A Deliberate Thing I Said Once to My Skin
TO CONSIDER my tattoos we must first consider skin. Skin is our barrier against the world, enveloping our body so that we won’t lose our precious water and evaporate like dew. The outer layer, the epidermis, lacks blood vessels and survives on oxygen
The Threepenny Review14 min read
The Almadraba
ELENA PICKS me up from Santa Justa and we set off for Chipiona. Her car is grey and battered. I’m not sure how she has acquired the ride and, like most things with Elena, it seems to invite more questions than it answers. The backseat is covered in c
The Threepenny Review13 min read
The Descendants: Modernism In The Age Of The Market
My Katherine Mansfield Project by Kirsty Gunn. Notting Hill Editions, 2016, $18.95 cloth. Typewriters, Bombs, Jellyfish by Tom McCarthy. New York Review Books, 2017, $16.95 paper. “AND WON’T the ‘Intellectuals’ just hate it,” Katherine Mansfield w
The Threepenny Review5 min read
Private Devotion
Greetings from Angelus by Gershom Scholem (translated by Richard Sieburth). Archipelago Books, 2018, $14.00 paper. IN 1648—the year, according to the Zohar, destined to usher in the messianic era—a Smyrnan Jew by the name of Shabbatai Tzvi received
The Threepenny Review17 min read
The Great Interruption: The Story of a Famous Story of Old Port William and How It Ceased To Be Told (1935–1978)
BILLY GIBBS was as lively a boy, no doubt, as he could have been made by a strong body, excellent health, an active mind, and an alert sense of humor much like that of his father, Grover Gibbs. Like about all the Port William boys of his time, his li
The Threepenny Review2 min read
Child and Adult
A High Wind in Jamaica, directed by Alexander Mackendrick, 1965. I WOULD NEVER say it’s the best movie I’ve ever seen nor that it’s my absolute favorite (that’s The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, about which I’ve already written). I don’t even like the leadin
The Threepenny Review2 min read
Thirteen Ways Of Looking At A Gift Subscription
1 You agree with Adam Zagajewski, who has described The Threepenny Review as “one of the most original literary magazines not only in the U.S. but also on the entire planet.” 2 You’re in possession of singularly valuable information: only you can jud
The Threepenny Review17 min read
A Symposium on Charm
Editor’s Note: As is always true in the case of our symposia, these contributions were written simultaneously and independently in response to the assigned topic. Any overlaps, parallels, or violent disagreements are therefore purely serendipitous.
The Threepenny Review10 min read
Playing Nurse
MY MOTHER flinches when I pull the tape, not at first, but when I get close to the incision. “How does it look?” she wants to know, for the twentieth time today. “It isn’t bad,” I say. I mean it. “Purplish, bruised, smaller than the other, but it isn
The Threepenny Review4 min readScience & Mathematics
Cultural Exchange
IN COPENHAGEN I was invited to speak to the Danish Council of Ethics, an advisory body that supplies the government with wisdom. The Council wished to be informed about the Dutch euthanasia policy. The members are theologians, sociologists, doctors,
The Threepenny Review9 min read
Like Life
Peter Hujar: Speed of Life, at the Morgan Library & Museum, New York, January–May 2018, and the Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive, July–October, 2018. Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body, at the Met Breuer, New York, March–July 2018.

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