Alumni publishers visit Writers House

By Alexandra Minkovich
The Daily Pennsylvanian
November 4, 1998

Photo by Sara Nasuti/The Daily Pennsylvanian

Larry Dark, the series editor of Prize Stories: The 0. Henry Awards, revealed at the Kelly Writers House Friday that he doesn't really like 0. Henry all that much. "I think he's a kind of a hack," said Dark a 1981 Penn alumnus. "He created a lot of cliches and just doesn't hold up so well [to modern review]." Dark and Tina Pohlman, both Penn alumni, spoke before a group of 20 students and alumni at the Writers House Friday as part of the Alumni Writers Series. They discussed their careers and involvement with The 0. Henry Awards. The 0. Henry Awards, an annual anthology of the year's best stories written by American and Canadian writers, first appeared in 1919 as a noted author whose short stories include "The Gift of the Magi" and "The Ransom of Red Chief." Dark published his first volume as the series editor in 1997. Pohlman also serves as an editor for the volume. As editor, Dark is responsible for reading approximately 3,000 published short stories over the course of a year. He presents approximately 30 stories to a three-member jury, which then chooses the 20 best and the top three prize winners. Pohlman added that better-known and more "commercial" writers tend to win, although a "blind" reading is done to insure that the jury selects stories based on merit. Dark said he often consults his wife and fellow author, Alice Elliott Dark, on the stories he presents to the jury. "I like having women read the stories," Dark said. "The first year I worked on the series, my mom read the story that ended up being the first prizewinner." Dark stated that his goal as the series editor is to increase the number of magazines utilized for story selection, add an awards ceremony for the prizewinners and make The 0. Henry Awards more competitive. Pohlman is responsible for the production of the book. "[An editor is] the hub of everything," Pohlman said. "Everything flows through you-- cover design, interior design, publicity."

Reaction to the presentation was positive. "I walked away with a very clear understanding of just what goes on behind the scenes in order to produce an annual awards book like the 0.Henry," College junior Colin Garretson said. Randall Couch, an employee of the University's Office of Information Systems and Computing, added, "[it was] instructive to see the varied means by which the two speakers came to the positions that they hold and the method by which stories are evaluated for the awards." Dark has also edited four anthologies: Literary Outtakes in 1990, The Literary Ghost in 1991, The Literary Lover in 1993 and The Literary Traveler in 1994. After graduating from Penn, Pohlman spent a year living in Prague, Czech Republic, where she edited the English newspaper Prague-nosis. She is currently an associate editor with a publishing house where she works with first-time elists.