We are now accepting applications for internships! As such, we thought we’d have a quick chat with a few past TLB interns. Interning at TLB is a famous experience, guaranteed to result in fame, and will definitely help you get on famously with other famous folks. We want to offer you a peek behind the wall of fame, and so we asked every past TLB intern the following two questions:
1. What are you doing now, and did interning at The Lifted Brow help you become The Best You You Can Be?
2. What is your favourite magazine (print, digital, or online) in the world, and why?
They responded thusly:
Jessica Yu
1. At the moment I’m working on founding and editing an upcoming interactive narrativity website called Betanarratives funded by the 2014 Young Writers Innovation Prize as well as a SIGNAL EOI grant. The Lifted Brow editor Sam was actually a judge on the panel for the Innovation Prize and after I got it he emailed me telling me he would love for my mag to be an imprint of TLB. I’m a bit of an idiot and I remember googling the word “imprint” that night and trying to figure out what it meant. For us it meant that as a little magazine we’d get loads of support from an already established one in heaps of cool ways like office space and mentorships and chats and idea-sharing. So that’s a really lovely thing that came out of my internship with The Brow… the fact that I never really left the office or said goodbye to them! As part of my internship, I also ended up writing a piece for the website which meant a lot to be as an avid reader of TLB and an emerging writer.
2. Haha. I feel so stupid saying this but I loved TLB for a long time before I started interning there. A few days after I finished my internship, I found the receipt for the first Brow I had ever bought in the car. It was really, really old and crumpled and I remembered the feeling of giddy newness that reading those stories for the very first time had given me.
Eloise Grills
1. I am currently studying a Masters of Creative Writing at the University of Melbourne, and working as a freelance writer and English tutor. Interning at The Lifted Brow gave me a real world grounding for my wild aspirations. The experience gave me an insight into how on earth I could turn a passion for words into something more tangible. Working amongst a team of talented writers and editors was also gratifying and really motivated me to get moving (and studying) what I love. Also now I am currently in a class taught by Sam Cooney (TLB editor) and I get the added motivation of being called on for the answers in class because he knows my name.
2. After The Brow (of course), my next favourite magazine fluctuates wildly, as I like to think of myself as being eclectic in my tastes (read: all over the place). I am really enjoying The Canary Press at the moment—I really appreciate that they are trying to breathe a fresh gust of coalmine air into the Melbourne lit-mag scene. It also doesn’t hurt that the writing they publish is top-notch.
Alexander Bennetts
1. Right now, I’m editing the Digital edition of The Lifted Brow. I did an internship at The Brow in 2012 when the magazine was based in Sydney, while I was unemployed in Newcastle, and I’d catch the 3-hour train once a week to come into the office. I interned alongside great human being Stephen Pham and it I learned too much stuff way too fast. It was very exciting. The team was really small but it meant we got to go hands on with reading/editing/organising all the fun stuff. I organised a couple of launches in Sydney and generally stuck around in The Brow headspace, and the Digital Brow editing gig kind of cropped up at the exact moment I was moving to Melbourne. It goes without saying that The Brow helped me get where I am. I think I know more about publishing/editing than someone with my education really should, and working with/alongside The Lifted Brow and its peoples definitely pushed me to that stage. I mean I’m a total dullard bozo (i.e. please don’t think I think highly of myself! I’m still an Australian!) but working at The Brow has lessened my bozo-ness somewhat.
You’re not going to publish this verbatim, right?!
2. Wow, what a tricky question. I mean the technical answer is The Lifted Brow but you already knew that. Let me get back to you when I’ve thought of something that makes me seem clever and clued-in and not as time poor as I really am.
Paul Dalla Rosa
1. Since my time interning I’ve actually been published in The Lifted Brow (#18), Hello Mr and Voiceworks. I’ve just given a reading as part of the Wheeler Centre’s “Next Big Thing” series and I am comics editor for the upcoming interactive journal Betanarratives, which will hopefully launch proper this January. My time at The Brow did a lot for me. There was a shitload of grunt work but it was good grunt work. Reading through the slush pile, though often depressing, helped me start to understand and learn to recognise what kind of fiction stands out and why. It’s an ongoing process but I’m happy to say it started at The Brow.
2. I remember being in New York and seeing Paris Review branded swimming trunks. They were utterly ridiculous, pretentious and yet slightly tempting, for good reason. Lorin Stein took over as editor for The Paris Review in 2010 and the stuff coming out since has been incredible. It’s put me onto some of my new favourite contemporary authors, often before their first book comes out, like Adam Wilson, Ben Lerner and the phenomenal Ottessa Moshfegh. The “Art of Fiction” interview series alone makes it worth subscribing or at least spending a Sunday morning trawling through their online archive.
Yoshua Wakeham
1. Not too long after my internship at The Brow, I took a “hard right” and went back to uni to study maths and science. So lately I’m spending rather more time reading textbooks than magazines. I can’t say interning at The Brow directly helped get me where I am today, but it did give me a valuable taste of the day-to-day running of an independent creative enterprise. On top of that, I’m proud I was able to contribute even slightly to such a neat publication!
2. I’d plump for The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books as my favourite (albeit online) magazines. Together they provide me with a daily feed of provocative, surprising and edifying reflections and critiques, across the whole spectrum of culture, politics and science. Few media contribute more to my understanding of, and engagement with, the world at large.
Patricia Tobin
1. I interned with The Brow in the beginning of 2014 while embarking on my Honours degree. I’m graduating from uni very shortly and I’m also currently the Social Media Manager at Writers Bloc. I’m a freelance arts reviewer too.
The Brow most definitely helped me get my gig at Writers Bloc, mainly ‘cos it looked real snazzy in my resume (which I’m terribly grateful for!). But most importantly, interning with The Brow made me realise that hanging around cool, literary people is a pretty good feeling so it spurred me towards looking for more word nerds.
2. I feel like this question sets you up for an expected answer but I’ll bite — it’s The Brow, of course! It’s because The Brow is weird yet readable; hip yet (at times) really dorky. The Brow carries a sharply distinct voice yet it’s still a part of a wider Australian literary community. In other words, it’s just a great mag.
Denise Rose Hansen
1. I am:
Writing a novel (2/3 there)
Studying MA English Studies at the University of Copenhagen
Working at the Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science in the office for international programmes - dry EU sorta job
And also working at Metropolitan University College where I translate and do creative stuff.
I think interning at The Brow has helped me land aforementioned jobs. The jobs are not in the field of publishing but many tasks are related to writing—having an international profile and a creative mind has been essential.
2.THE BROW. Always fun. Always high quality. Gorgeous illustrations.
Emma Jones
1. Yeah, I reckon so! In August 2014 I worked for the Emerging Writers’ Festival as a Digital Reporter at the Melbourne Writers Festival, which was a super chill time, and in October at the National Young Writers’ Festival I hosted a workshop called “Writing Sex” which was, obvi, about writing about sex, and was really fun for me and hopefully for all the participants. I’ve also been doing a lot of freelance writing, and am working on commissioned pieces right now for places like Spook Magazine and the good old Brow itself.
2. I know this is a copout but this question is totally way too hard to answer truthfully. There are so many great magazines and journals putting great shit out there that I love. My newest fave is an online magazine I discovered the other day, called Adult Magazine. They publish some really brave and beautiful writing on erotics and lived sexual experience, with a little critical theory thrown in for good measure. For a similar pop-theory vibe without all the sex, The Toast is also pretty great. The cool folks at Scum Mag recently put together a zine of awkward teen stories called Blue Light Disco which launched at NYWF and is a total ripper.
Joel Cotterell
1. I’m embracing uni holidays and have (finally) started some freelance editing work for RMIT. The Brow definitely helped me hone those editing skills, tune (more) in to fresh writers and, yep, become The Best Me I Can Be for now!
2. My favourite magazine is maybe… Jacobin? Less literary than The Brow, sure, but I really appreciate their coverage of misc. issues and movements and their position on the fun-rigour spectrum.
Ania Anderst
1. I’m currently working part-time at The Wheeler Centre reception desk, and also spend a fair chunk of time at 3CR Community Radio, co-hosting the Tuesday Breakfast Show and The Radioactive Show. For sure, The Lifted Brow helped me get where I am today. It exposed me to Melbourne’s literary world and skilled me up in administration and website tasks.
2.Overland. For not being afraid of properly engaging with difficult and messy topics, telling it how it is.
Leona Hameed
1. At the moment I’m producing the Meanjin podcast, working as the state coordinator for the radio show All The Best and working part time in Melbourne talkback radio. Interning at The Lifted Brow was so great. I met heaps of excellent people - it also meant I could afford to see The Moth when they visited for the Melbourne Writers Festival which was a real inspiring introduction to live storytelling. Also, transcribing a Jessie Borelle’s interview with Ophira Eisenberg (issue #19) introduced me to Paper Radio for which I am forever grateful. They also let me write for them and their entire editorial team were super generous and smart and taught me a whole lot about interviewing and how to approach writing in an interesting and different way.
2.The Lifted Brow obviously. Also Meanjin, Believer, Kill Your Darlings and The Monthly, among others.
Jessica Walter
1. I recently completed the Master of Publishing and Communications at the University of Melbourne and am currently doing freelance editorial work. I continue to volunteer for small journals, working with antiTHESIS until the end of 2014. Working for The Brow exposed me to a different side of independent publishing and the variety of writing styles that Melbourne has to offer.
2. At the moment I love Aeon magazine. As a student of writing and publishing, my studies have been very niche and in mags like Aeon—and even The Brow—good writers become great teachers and I get to learn something I may never have known about art, science, philosophy and culture.
Sean Watson.
1. I guess right now I’m kind of in a transitional stage. I’m just finishing up my stint editing Farrago, the student magazine at Melbourne Uni, while trying to tie up the loose ends of my Bachelors. Interning at The Brow certainly helped me in getting that editorship, as it taught me everything from copyediting to production cycles to finicky info-management. I’ve also been recently offered a spot helping out with TLB's fiction section, which I'm very stoked about.
2. I’m pretty bad at commitment when it comes to magazines. I subscribe to barely any. Like a lot of people who also read TLB, I’m pretty into The Believer – I’m pretty sold on their long essays, and their columns are really novel and always compelling. In terms of online magazines I read a lot of Hazlitt, who also do a really great podcast called The Arcade.
Tom O’Connell
1. The biggest change since my tenure as a Brow intern is I’ve completed my Writing and Publishing degree. Unfortunately, this means I’m now in the awkward transitional period between man-child student and fully-fledged working adult. Thus far I’ve been filling my days with various writing projects, some freelance editing and the relentless dispensing of job applications. I’m also looking at setting up an editing website in the coming weeks.
Interning with The Lifted Brow was a great experience. It taught me the value of a good brainstorming session, and showed me that publishing is extremely collaborative (you should see how much collective elbow grease goes into each issue), and that Docklands is actually a pretty cool place (who knew?). While it hasn’t been long since my internship wrapped, I do feel better prepared to enter the fray of professional publishing. I was able to use the internship to attain RPL in my degree and think the CV credit will prove valuable, too. Time will tell, but I’ll happily endorse an internship with The Lifted Brow. Anyone with a general interest in publishing (or specific interest in The Brow) will doubtlessly get a lot from it.
2. Nowadays, I read more blogs than magazines, but have always been partial to Australian print mag Hyper. I grew up reading it and enjoy the irreverent humour and subversive take on video game culture. There’s no pandering with Hyper; reading it, you genuinely feel like part of a community. Sure, a lot of comparable content is available free online, but it’s worth paying for content when you find a pack of writers whose style you genuinely enjoy.
Jessie Henley
1. I’m about thisclose to finishing my Associate Degree in Professional Writing and Editing at RMIT, doing Managing Editor-y things for my course’s publication: visible ink, and doing social media for The Brow! If I didn’t intern with TLB I doubt I’d be doing social media for them, which is fun! But I dunno if that constitutes being The Best I Can Be. Hope not. Don’t wanna peak too early, y’know?
2. If I don’t say The Lifted Brow do I get in trouble? (If yes: The Lifted Brow. If no: … probs still The Lifted Brow.)
Oliver Mestitz
1. I’m still doing what I was doing before my internship at The Lifted Brow , which is writing stories and singing songs. I like to think I’ve gotten better at both of these things. I wrote for the Brow twicemore last year and a short story of mine has just been published in Transportation: Islands and Cities. I’m also releasing a new album (as The Finks) on Milk! Records.
2.Five Dials, because they do everything right.
Gemma White
1. I have started a counselling and art therapy practice, empowering clients to grow towards their joy, find their life direction and pursue it with clarity, ultimately helping people to re-ignite their passions and live happier lives! (www.dytherapies.com). This may seem totally left of field, considering I have a background in publishing and editing, but I am passionate about helping people. In the past I did this through supporting writers by publishing their work in poetry publications I made under the moniker Only Words Apart Media. This was a one-woman ship though, and I found it hard to make the projects sustainable. By doing an internship at The Lifted Brow, I realised how much actual WORK and PEOPLE are needed to keep a journal afloat. I realised that as one person, I didn’t have the resources to do all of that myself. It was a bit of a reality check and I decided against making any more lit journals alone. Only Words Apart Media had been a fun journey, and I’d met lots of awesome writers through it, but I also wanted to focus on something different, which is now my art therapy practice. The Lifted Brow helped me to be the best I can be by showing me that this business of publishing is not easy, and doesn’t usually make a lot of cash, and so if you’re in it, you’d better absolutely love it, live and breathe it, because that is really what it takes. I had lived and breathed it from 2008 till 2013. It was a good innings! In the end, I found that publishing, although interesting and writing-related, was not really my passion, but that is a very valuable thing to realise, and I am grateful for the chance to find that out through practical experience. It is really only by doing stuff and trying stuff out that I have figured out my own life direction and that is an ongoing process! :)
2. Although I enjoy writing, I don’t actually read magazines all that much… I have subscribed to a few in the past including Overland, Meanjin, and The Lifted Brow (of course!) amongst others. But I get most excited about the new local journals and magazines that pop up here and there, especially ones with high production values, that are tactile, with pretty or high quality textural papers. My latest favourite is Regime Magazine, because it’s a quality publication in both look and content.
Amanda D’Costa
1. I interned at TLB in 2012, under the guidance of Ronnie Scott. I can say with confidence that the total immersion in the world of the mag seriously sharpened my editorial knife so that now when I edit my own writing I can detach myself and be necessarily ruthless. Since TLB, I’ve graduated with a degree I am yet to find good use for, been working at an NGO and writing freelance on travel and social change. I’ve been travelling on and off, climbing mountains (literally and figuratively) and my ambition is to ultimately become location-independent.
2. It’s a little daggy but my favourite magazine remains to this day (as it has been since I was about nine) National Geographic. One of my most prized possessions is the issue from the month of my birth. I think I’ve accumulated most of my knowledge about the world, the universe, ancient civilisations, dinosaurs, the deepest place on Earth, the highest place on Earth, shipwrecks, volcanoes, tsunamis, human evolution and so on and so forth, from features in back issues of National Geographic. It inspires me to explore, and seek knowledge through discovery. And of course, the pipe dream is to be a contributing NG writer some day.
Sophie Lloyd
1. Since interning at The Lifted Brow in July 2014, I’ve started working as a bookseller at Readings. Whilst interning, I volunteered to deliver the pile of The Lifted Brow issue 23 destined for the Readings shelves, with a plan to segue the delivery into a request for employment. Unfortunately, the pile proved too large to balance on my bicycle for the uphill ride from Docklands to Carlton. Although this plan didn’t work out, The Lifted Brow internship did help to place me at Readings; I definitely name-dropped The Lifted Brow during the interview.
2. I can spend endless happy hours poring over interior decorating magazines, inexhaustibly verbalising my critical or covetous reactions to this pairing of carpet to bedspread or that weirdly-placed pouf. I particularly enjoy meeting the inhabitants of the featured microcosms, so I’m going to go with Apartamento.