Aims of Laika Poetry Review / Submission Guidelines

“I grow weary of the old tongues.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

“Rock and roll adolescents storm into the streets of all nations. They rush into the Louvre and throw acid in the Mona Lisa's face. They open zoo's, insane asylums, prisons, burst water mains with air hammers, chop the floor out of passenger plane lavatories, shoot out lighthouses, turn sewers into water supply, administer injections with bicycle pumps, they shit on the floor of the United Nations and wipe their ass with treaties, pacts, alliances." - William S Burroughs (Naked Lunch)


What are the aims of the Laika Poetry Review?

Laika Poetry Review is an online poetry and short story journal that seeks to promote a literary counterculture. Our inspirations are the alternative poets, the prophets rather than the kings, the disgraces and embarrassments of their day who chose the ditch to the middle-of the road. We wish to revive the French tradition of the "poetes maudits" (damned poets) those like Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine and Charles Baudelaire. It is a counter-culture that stretches right back to Li Po, who drowned in the Yangtze River while attempting to drunkenly embrace the moon. We believe poetry must be seized from the snobs and post-modern charlatans who have stolen it. In Laika we will seek to showcase writing that is exciting and accessible.

We will promote a diverse range of work but will primarily search for writers fuelled by rebellion and intoxication, who’ve no concern for respectability or being bought and sold. We are more interested in writers who get their kicks from the Beta Band, Jane's Addiction, Iggy Pop or Arcade Fire than from T S Eliot. It will be by and for those who have no interest in smug elitist literary cliques. We are particularly eager to hear from eager young writers who have been banging their heads against established poetry outlets to no avail. We encourage work that combines boundless imagination with the realisation that the writer is the natural enemy of the tyrant, the puritan and the materialist. We seek to be more Brautigan than Betjeman, more Holub than Hughes.

Writing can, and must, follow film, which has become democratised with the advent of cheap digital media. In 1977 there was a brilliant directive by Mark Perry on the cover of the punk fanzine Sniffin’ Glue, it demonstrated, "This is a chord. This is another. This is a third. Now form a band." The same ethos that revolutionised music is needed for literature. Take a pen, a page, the contents of your head, now start writing. In the absence of writers to believe in we must become them ourselves.

- Darran Anderson.

Submission Guidelines.

We accept original poetry contributions and short stories if they are particularly good and relatively short (less than 2000 words). No chick lit, no science fiction, no abstract self-indulgent pretentious stuff or introspective angst please. No poems about flowers, having to take prozac or working in an office please. No haikus. First preference will be given to poems that do not contain the word "I." We are looking for work that surveys the world rather than indulging in introspection. Any blatant diatribes against say war or capitalism will have to be almost impossibly good to make it. We want you to be as imaginative as possible, think magical realism with a radical edge. Surprise us.

We regret, at present, we cannot offer any financial payment for accepted works. All work must be previously unpublished and must be all the persons own original work. We accept simultaneous submissions but please please inform us immediately if it is published elsewhere. Due to the large amount of correspondence we regret we may not be able to reply to all mail however we will try our best. Do not be disheartened. Send all submissions (no more than 6 pieces at one time plus a brief bio) to laikapoetryreview at hotmail dot com clearly labelled and spaced on the body of the email (no attachments) and title all emails “Poetry Submissions.” Due to the danger of viruses we cannot open any work that does not have this title. We welcome work from all over the world and accept any poems in any language as long as a high quality English translation is provided.

Legal Note.

We reserve the right to publish and reproduce submitted material in electronic formats. Upon publication rights revert to the author. We do however reserve the right to archive the work online. By submitting your work to Laika Poetry Review, you acknowledge that you have read and agree to all submission guidelines.