Unlikely 2.0
Unlikely 2.0 is the follow-up to the now-defunct Unlikely Stories, a literary online magazine that ran from 1998 to 2003. Unlikely 2.0 went live on June 14, 2004. Since then, it has published approximately 22 issues a year, 11 of which are dedicated primarily to poetry, fiction, non-fiction, and essays, and 11 of which are dedicated primarily to visual art, films, and music. It features the ongoing column, A Sardine on Vacation by Robert Castle, which is also available in book form from Spuyten Duyvil, and a regular column of reviews of classic films by Dan Schneider. Unlikely 2.0 also publishes occasional reviews and interviews from other authors, as well as chapbooks in Adobe PDF format.
Unlikely 2.0 is largely defined by its 3200 word combination Mission Statement and Submission Guidelines, which begins:
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We operate under two assumptions: 1. Western society is broken, and all aspects, including art, of Western society reflect this fact. We hope to be able to help repair this brokenness by loudly and frankly discussing the nature of the breakage. 2. ALL humans are the captains of their fate and masters of their soul (to borrow a wording from Invictus by William Ernest Henley). To interfere with another's right to their fate and soul is the quintessence of criminal behavior. We are not interested in debating or discussing these assumptions. We realize they are not infallible, but we don't have the time. We are interested in debating and discussing, in great detail, how best to apply these assumptions to the real world. |
Thus, Unlikely 2.0, despite being primarily a magazine of the arts, pursues an an artistic aesthetic only insofar as it explores a platform of frank, and often pessimistic, humanism; as far as traditional conceptions of artistic aesthetic goes, it can only be described as "eclectic."
Jonathan Penton, who served as Editor of Unlikely Stories, now serves as Editor-in-Chief of Unlikely 2.0. K. R. Copeland serves as Art Director, Mary Jo Malo serves as Staff Reviewer, and Gabriel Ricard serves as Staff Interviewer. Unlikely 2.0 is located at UnlikelyStories.org, where the archives of Unlikely Stories are also hosted.
