Copper Nickel Issue 40

Copper Nickel is the national literary journal housed at the University of Colorado Denver. It is edited by poet, editor, and translator Wayne Miller (author of six collections, including The End of Childhood and We the Jury, coeditor of Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century, and co-translator of Moikom Zeqo’s Zodiac) and co-editor Joanna Luloff (author of Remind Me Again What Happened and The Beach at Galle Road)—along with poetry editors Brian Barker (author of Vanishing Acts, The Black Ocean, and The Animal Gospels) and Nicky Beer (author of Real Phonies and Genuine Fakes, The Octopus Game, and The Diminishing House), and fiction editors Teague Bohlen (author of The Pull of the Earth), Christopher Merkner (author of The Rise & Fall of the Scandamerican Domestic), and Emily Wortman-Wunder (author of Not a Thing to Comfort You).

Since the journal’s relaunch in 2015, work published in Copper Nickel has been regularly selected for inclusion in Best American Poetry, Best American Short Stories, Best Small Fictions, Best Literary Translations, and the Pushcart Prize Anthology, and has often been listed as “notable” in the Best American Essays. According to Clifford Garstang’s 2024 literary journal rankings, Copper Nickel is ranked number 15 for poetry and number 35 for fiction, out of more than 700 regularly publishing literary journals.

Contributors to Copper Nickel have received numerous honors for their work, including the Nobel Prize; the National Book Critics Circle Award; the Pulitzer Prize; the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award; the Kate Tufts Discovery Award; the Laughlin Award; the American, California, Colorado, Minnesota, and Washington State Book Awards; the Georg Büchner Prize; the Prix Max Jacob; the Griffin Poetry Prize; the Lenore Marshall Prize; the T. S. Eliot and Forward Prizes; the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award; the Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award; the Lambda Literary Award; as well as fellowships from the NEA and the MacArthur, Guggenheim, Ingram Merrill, Witter Bynner, Soros, Rona Jaffee, Bush, and Jerome Foundations. 

Copper Nickel is published twice a year, on March 15 and October 15, and is distributed nationally to bookstores and other outlets by Publishers Group West (PGW) and Accelerate 360. 

Issue 40 Includes:

• Translation Folios featuring contemporary Ukrainian poet Yuri Andrukhovych, translated by John Hennessy and Ostap Kin; modernist Russian poet Andrey Platonov, translated by George Kovalenko; and contemporary Chinese fiction writer Yang Hao, translated by Michael Day.

• New Poetry by PEN Open Book Martins Award winner Timothy Liu, William Carlos Williams Award winner G. C. Waldrep, Whiting Award winner Matt Donovan, Isabella Gardner Award winner Keetje Kuipers, Lannan Literary Fellow Natalie Scenters-Zapico, Kate Tufts Award winner Janice N. Harrington, Ballymaloe International Poetry Prize winner Lee Sharkey, NEA Fellows John Isles and Orlando Ricardo Menes, Cave Canem Fellow Miles E. Johnson, National Poetry Series winners Justin Boening and Rosalie Moffett, Best American Poetry contributor Brionne Janae, Poets Out Loud Prize winner Sara Michas-Martin, and many others.

• New Fiction by Rome Prize winner Matthew Neill Null, NEA Fellow Alyson Hagy, O. Henry and Pushcart contributor Ayşe Papatya Bucak, and relative newcomers Melissa Bowers and Ash Kaul.

• New Essays by Kingsley Tufts Award winner Marianne Boruch and NEA Fellow Vedran Husić.

• Cover Art by Venezuelan-born, Nebraska-based artist Francisco Souto.

Contributor Locations

Contributors to issue 40 come from all over the country and the world. 

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U.S. cities/regions where contributors and staff are concentrated include (organized alphabetically by state):

San Francisco Bay Area, CA (contributors Melissa Bowers, John Isles, Ostap Kin, Pattabi Seshadri, and Todd Turnidge; contributing editor Randall Mann)

Los Angeles, CA (contributor James Ciano; contributing editors Victoria Chang, Piotr Florczyk, Amaud Jamaul Johnson, and Chris Santiago)

Denver, CO (home of Copper Nickel and the Copper Nickel staff)

Tampa, FL (contributors Vedran Husić and Natalie Scenters-Zapico)

Amherst, MA (contributors Matt Donovan and John Hennessy)

Boston/Cambridge, MA (contributing editors Martha Collins and Frederick Reiken)

Saint Louis, MO (contributor Chad Parmenter, contributing editor Niki Herd)

Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN (home of Milkweed Editions; contributing editor V. V. Ganeshananthan)

Saint Louis, MO (contributor Mary Jo Bang; contributing editor Niki Herd)

Missoula, MT (contributor Keetje Kuipers, contributing editor Sean Hill)

New York, NY (contributors David Hopson, Brionne Janae, and George Kovalenko)

Philadelphia, PA (contributor Justin Boening, contributing editor Adrienne Perry)

Pittsburgh, PA (contributor Miles E. Johnson, contributing editors Joy Katz and Kevin Haworth)

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U.S. cities/regions with individual contributors (organized alphabetically by state):

Carmel, CA (contributor Sara Michas-Martin)

Joshua Tree, CA (contributor Louise Mathias)

San Diego, CA (contributor Michael Day)

Washington, DC (contributing editor David Keplinger)

Boca Raton, FL (contributor Ayşe Papatya Bucak)

Boise, ID (contributing editor Emily Ruskovich)

Champaign, IL (contributor Janice N. Harrington)

Chicago, IL (contributing editor Robert Archambeau)

Evansville, IN (contributor Rosalie Moffett)

South Bend, IN (contributor Orlando Ricardo Menes)

West Lafayette, IN (contributor Marianne Boruch)

Lexington, KY (contributing editor Ada Limón)

Windham, ME (contributor Kimberly Ann Priest)

Middleville, MI (contributor Kathleen McGookey)

Jefferson City, MO (contributor Peter Monacell)

Kansas City, MO (contributor Luisa Muradyan)

Graham, NC (contributor Ryan Clark)

Greensboro, NC (contributing editor Emilia Phillips)

Newark, NJ (contributor Ashley Bockholdt)

Princeton, NJ (contributing editor James Richardson)

Canton, NY (contributing editor Pedro Ponce)

Endwell, NY (contributor Dante Di Stefano)

New Paltz, NY (contributor Timothy Liu)

Easton, PA (contributor Owen McLeod)

Lewisburg, PA (contributor G. C .Waldrep)

Shamokin Dam, PA (contributor Matthew Neill Null)

Tulsa, OK (contributing editor Kavey Bassiri)

Memphis, TN (contributor Maria Zoccola)

Dallas, TX (contributing editor Tarfia Faizullah)

Springville, UT (contributor Lance Larsen)

Madison, WI (contributor Aurora Shimshak)

Laramie, WY (contributor Alyson Hagy)

Blacksburg, VA (contributing editor Janine Joseph)

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International contributors live in:

Navi Mumbai, India (contributor Ash Kaul)

Belfast, Northern Ireland (contributor Milena Williamson)

Berlin, Germany (contributing editor Alexander Lumans)

Ivano-Frankvsk, Ukraine (contributor Yuri Andrukhovych)

Dublin, Ireland (contributor Yang Hao)

Copper Nickel is edited by poet and translator Wayne Miller (author of Post-, The City, Our City, and The End of Childhood, coeditor of Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century, and cotranslator of Moikom Zeqo’s Zodiac) as well as poetry editors Brian Barker and Nicky Beer, and prose editors Teague Bohlen and Joanna Luloff. He lives in Denver, CO.