presentation summary

The Fourth River

About the Fourth River

The Fourth River welcomes submissions of creative writing that explore the relationship between humans and their environments, both natural and built, urban, rural or wild. We are looking for writings that are richly situated at the confluence of place, space and identity, or that reflect upon or make use of landscape and place in new ways. Nature and environmental writing that is edgy and provocative, that goes beyond traditional nature writing, and contributes to a new type of place-based writing has the best chance of finding a home in our journal.

Pittsburgh is situated at the confluence of three rivers: the Monongahela, Allegheny, and Ohio. A fourth underground river, unseeable but indispensable to the city’s riverine ecosystem, is one muse for our journal. As our founding editor, Jeffrey Thomson, wrote in first issue of The Fourth River, we are inspired by the notion that “between and beneath the visible framework of the human world and the built environment, there exist deeper currents of force and meaning supporting the very structure of that world."

Our second muse is Rachel Carson, Chatham’s most distinguished alum, who wrote, in “Design for Nature Writing”:

“... if we are true to the spirit of John Burroughs, or of Jeffries or Hudson or Thoreau, we are not imitators of them but—as they themselves were—we are pioneers in new areas of thought and knowledge. If we are true to them, we are the creators of a new type of literature as representative of our own day as was their own.”

Submissions

Contests

Our 2009 contests are now open for submissions (guidelines below).

Deadlines have passed for our two recent 2008 contests: The Fourth River Award for Poetry and The Fourth River Award for Creative Nonfiction. A big thanks to all who submitted. Winners will be chosen on March 31st, and announced on our website and in our newsletter soon thereafter.

Fourth River Award for Poetry 2009
Fourth River Award for Creative Nonfiction 2009

We are looking for poetry and creative nonfiction that capture the places—natural, built and imagined, urban, rural or wild—where humans and nature converge and collide.

First place winner in each category will be published in the Fourth River and will receive a $500 cash prize upon publication.

Contest judges to be announced.


Contest Guidelines

1. Submissions should be postmarked no later than October 15, 2009
2. Previously published works and works accepted for publication elsewhere are not eligible. Students, faculty and employees of Chatham University are not eligible.
3. Include a title page with your name, address, phone number and the title of your submission(s). Your name must not appear on the actual manuscript.
4. The reading fee is $5 for three poems or one essay (7,000 word maximum), and includes a copy of Issue 7. Please make checks payable to Chatham University. Multiple submissions are acceptable, but each submission must be accompanied by a reading fee. Manuscripts will not be returned.
(Please note: the reading fee does not apply to regular submissions.)
5. Send your submission, your reading fee and a self-addressed stamped envelope to:

The Fourth River
Chatham University
Woodland Road
Pittsburgh, PA 15232
Attention: Fourth River Award for (please insert genre here--Poetry or Nonfiction).


Submit Your Work

**Note: Submissions are now closed for both Issue 6 and the International Issue--no new submissions will be reviewed at this time. The International Issue is due for release in Fall 2009, and Issue 6 in Spring 2010.

The Fourth River will begin reading work for Issue 7 on August 1, 2009.


Submission Guidelines

In August, the Fourth River will be accepting nonfiction, short fiction, poetry, and young adult/children ’s writing (without illustration). Please send up to seven poems or up to 7,000 words of prose to the address below. Due to the volume of submissions we receive, we will recycle all the manuscripts we receive. Please do not send us your only copy.

No reading fee is required for submission to Issue 7. Accepted authors receive two contributor's copies of the journal.

* Include cover letter with name, address, phone number, email contact, and titles of enclosed work.
* All manuscripts must include a SASE for response to be considered.
* No e-mail submissions accepted.
* Kindly let us know if you are submitting simultaneously, and inform us if your work is accepted elsewhere.
* Reading Period (for standard issues): August 1 – February 15

Submission Address

The Fourth River
Chatham University
Woodland Road
Pittsburgh, PA 15232