The Private Press Competitors

McSweeney’s is a publishing company based in San Francisco. As well as operating a daily humor website, we publish a short-story quarterly, a bimonthly magazine, and an ever-growing selection of books under various imprints. We are a fiscally sponsored project of SOMArts, a San Francisco nonprofit arts incubator.

Graywolf Press is a leading independent publisher committed to the discovery and energetic publication of contemporary American and international literature. We champion outstanding writers at all stages of their careers to ensure that diverse voices can be heard in a crowded marketplace. We believe books that nourish the individual spirit and enrich the broader culture must be supported by attentive editing, superior design, and creative promotion. Graywolf Press was founded in Port Townsend, Washington, in 1974 by Scott Walker. Graywolf’s first publications were limited-edition chapbooks of poetry, which were printed on a letterpress and hand sewn by Walker and his colleagues. Over the years Graywolf has expanded its list to include novels, short stories, memoirs, essays, as well as poetry. Today, Graywolf is considered one of the nation’s leading nonprofit literary publishers.

More than two decades on, n+1 has “established itself as the bellwether of a new generation of literary intellectuals” (Harper’s). It has published dozens of book-length magazines, thousands of online-only pieces, and a handful of critically acclaimed books, as well as programmed countless readings, panels, and events across New York City. Its editorial mission remains to encourage writers, new and established, to take themselves as seriously as possible, to write with as much energy and daring as possible, and to connect their own deepest concerns with the broader social and political environment—that is, to write, while it happens, a history of the present day.