Each year less than one half of all Americans read at least one work of literature and that number continues to steadily and alarmingly decline. Publishers and bookstores are increasingly monolithic and profit driven, printing and selling only what is safe and sure without consideration of artistic merit. Like medieval monks copying the works of Classical writers, literary journals preserve the light of literature in these difficult times. Language is more than data, it is sustenance.
Diner provides a panoramic view of the American literary landscape. Through its eclectic and visionary content readers are exposed to the daringly experimental, to classical form, and everything in between.
Diner offers a unique format, including two featured poets with ten representative pages of their poetry along with in-depth interviews, bringing you an intimate look into the process and works of poets and translators that you will find nowhere else.
Diner thinks locally and acts globally. Diner has printed poems, essays, fiction and graphics by seventy-two writers and artists who reside in or have close ties to Worcester and central New England and hundreds of writers from throughout the USA and Canada, while at the same time printing original translations from contemporary Spanish, Romanian, Polish, Ukrainian, Algerian, French and Russian as well as work in English from India, New Zealand, France, and other countries.
Diner seeks out the best by stepping outside the box. Work by firemen, social workers, doctors, computer programmers, and numerous other professions, as well as the indigent and economically disadvantaged, have appeared in these pages. Diner has also printed poetry by Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award nominees as well as winners of other prestigious awards.