When you reach the main page of the website for the Brazenhead Review, you find yourself in a black-and-white photo, in a room with shelves overflowing with books, as the word Enter floats in the center, inviting you in. You have landed in the 84th Street apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan where for years Michael Seidenberg ran his secret (legally unsanctioned) secondhand bookstore, Brazenhead Books. Here Seidenberg would welcome book lovers who knew the address and would come for literary discussions, perhaps some whisky, and recommendations about a good book. And it was here that the idea for the Brazenhead Review was conceived.
Jeff “J.T.” Price ’01 is the editor in chief of the magazine. He was also a frequent visitor to Brazenhead Books and knew Seidenberg well. And while he was not the originator of the review—that would have been Seidenberg’s assistant, Simona Blat, and her coeditor, Mo Z, who published the first issue in 2015, bankrolled by Seidenberg—he came on board in 2022. Blat had done the 2015 issue as a limited-edition print run after the 84th Street bookshop was shut down when Seidenberg was evicted (the address had become too well known). She then published a second volume online in memory of Seidenberg after he passed away in 2019. Price joined the operation with the intention of returning the review to print and honoring the original idea behind its conception.
That original idea was steeped in Seidenberg’s own philosophies. As the website asserts, “Anyone and everyone was welcome at Brazenhead Books and Michael was well-known for encouraging open dialogues on myriad topics. The magazine continues in this tradition, in his honor, to channel open-minded, good-humored, and anti-oppressive ways of communicating.” It also encourages new writers and “seeks to emphasize substance over clout.” Hence, one of its unique features is a scratch-off sticker placed over the author’s name for every piece in the magazine. Price says, “We want the reader to have a direct encounter with the work without bringing preconceived notions to bear, whether they are seeking out a friend or a famous author. We read our submissions without knowing who the writer is and want to extend that experience to our readers.” Indeed, the submission guidelines warn that any document with biographical information on it will not be read.
One of Price’s first acts as editor in chief was to raise enough money to get the publication back into print and pay writers a fair rate. He then led the review through the production of three issues, March 2023, September 2023, and May 2024. Price selects and edits prose submitted to the review and has poetry editors for choosing the poems. When asked what he looks for in a piece, he says, “The honest answer is that I select narrative work that strikes me as containing a radical juxtaposition side-by-side with the other chosen work. I’m not after a uniform aesthetic or style of messaging, but a vibrant mix. I like work that surprises me. I want each issue to be like a sampler plate of contemporary excellence.” One story he ran, by writer Emily Simon, was about a young woman consciously exploring how “lying down” shaped her life; another was flash fiction about Michelangelo as an immeasurably talented animate pea in danger of being devoured whole by his giant human patron, the Pope. (Due to the blind submission process, it was only when this story was accepted that they learned it was by the novelist John Wray.)
The publication of Brazenhead Review is a labor of love for Price and his team. Not only do they take great care in selecting content, they make each issue a work of art. “It’s more about creating a precious object than anything intended for mass production,” Price says. So how would Seidenberg feel about the Brazenhead Review of today? “He was in the habit of joking that he wanted a talking bust, or ‘brazen head,’ of himself when he was gone. Push a button and it would say one of Michael’s favorite sayings. Well, our R&D department is still developing that, but the Brazenhead Review is the next best thing, and I’d like to think that Michael would agree.”
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