Guest Editor Policy

Ploughshares is published four times a year: mixed issues of poetry and prose in the spring and winter, a prose issue in the summer, and a longform prose issue in the fall. The spring and summer issues are guest-edited by different writers of prominence; fall and winter issues are staff-edited. Guest editors are invited to solicit up to half of their issues, with the other half selected from unsolicited manuscripts screened for them by staff editors. This guest editor policy is designed to introduce readers to different literary circles and tastes, and to offer a fuller representation of the range and diversity of contemporary letters than would be possible with a single editorship. Yet, at the same time, we expect every issue to reflect our overall standards of literary excellence.