Founded in 1944 as an amazing cola-flavored beverage
and dissolved in 1960 because it was a magazine,
we are carrying on the legacy of Bastards and Whores today.
What's with the name?
Bastards and Whores: It's a succinct way of expressing our philosophy and confusing it simultaneously. We're bastards to other literary venues (if we could punch them we would) and whores because we'd sell-out for anything. We are not porn (although we endorse porn and porn addiction and also porn addiction counseling).
It's immature, vulgar, and maybe sexist, and we don't know which of those applies to us yet.
What's our twenty?
We're based out of Lawrence, Kansas. We're not affiliated with the great University of Kansas, although we've all been there. They have good tea on Thursdays.
Lawrence is the birthplace of basketball, Lynx (an early text-based internet browser), and Google Earth. Local old people keep dated lists of when certain famous artists have come through town, and honestly, this is a great community for art to thrive. It is also a great community for technology geeks to thrive. So it seems like the perfect place for an online literary magazine.
We love our town and we love the Midwest, and even though we would love to include the local talent, we can't extend any bias toward it (unless there's bribery involved, but that's really the case with anything).
What's with the submissions guidelines?
We are serious about everything listed there. We're convinced that everyone in the world is capable of producing something that we could use. We really will consider doodles, lists, charts, and graphs. We really do want ridicule and parody of famous and unknown fiction.
And by the way, we love genre fiction, especially the extreme types. We're still waiting for that good historical erotica or steam-punk zombie-thriller.
Who died and made us Captain of the Internets?
Captain of the Internets is not a title of succession. However, we were appointed Captain of the Internets after George R. R. Martin was shot in the face by HBO programming chief Michael Lombardo.
A face to the creators:
Josh, Joe, and Amanda. We're all in our twenties, and we're all bastards and whores.