Artifice is a biannual print journal that—as the name implies—showcases work aware of its own artifice. 

Below is our wishlist. The following are not prompts, but rather examples of the sorts of things, tonally and formally, we’d like to receive. 

• 1 mistranslation
• 2 concrete poems that require the use of mirrors
• 3 stories that include images, not as illustrations, but as integral parts of the stories themselves
• 7 answers to the riddles in The Exeter Book
• 5 manifestos
• 1 story that would make Kathy Acker laugh
• 1 story that would make Donald Barthelme cry
• 1 Heian-period pillow book
• 2 stories or poems that require folding or cutting the paper on which they are printed
• 2 ransom notes
• 2 responses to ransom notes
• 3 stories or poems in the form of rules to an imaginary game
• 30-40 drawings for a corner-of-the-magazine flip book 
• 1 story in musical notation
• 1 phenomenology
• 1 collaborative essay in the form of tracked changes to a shared document 
• 2 poems that require legal advice
• 2 poems that require bodyguards
• 5 stories without characters
• 1 distich
• 2 monostichs 
• 2 stories written in bad faith
• 1 mathematical proof
• 5 transcribed field recordings
• 7 diagrams of horrible machines
• 1 treasure map to a real-world object hidden by the author
• 1 narrative in the form of a maze
• 1 maze in the form of a narrative
• 1 story that requires us to print in the gutter
• The Voynich manuscript, decoded
• The contents of a specialist’s drawer
• 5 poems or stories in the form of equations
• 1 time bomb, ticking or otherwise
• 10 calls for moratoria
• 10 calls to arms
• 1 story designed for easy disassembly and transport
• 3 show bibles for unairable sitcoms
• 1 ode written in code
• 15 aphorisms
• 10 fractals
• 2 contradictions
• 2 contraindications
• 1 piece you’d tell a child not to put in its mouth
• 1 threat to national security
• 3 comics 
• 4 labyrinths created using parentheses, footnotes, endnotes, etc.
• 1 bundle of hate mail tied with a shoelace 
• 1 bundle of love letters tied with a licorice lace
• 1 story told entirely in screenshots
• 3 of the saddest sentences ever written
• Something that will stump our graphic designer
• Something that includes a Greek chorus
• Addenda to Minima Moralia 
• 3 choose-your-own adventures
• 3 adventures you chose on your own
• 4 pieces that require you to show your math
• 1 invitation to an invitation-only bacchanal
• 1 poem in anagrams
• 1 poem in charts
• 1 story in novels
• 2 stories or essays that require active reader participation
• 1 “real” essay on the subject of “fake” essays
• 1 “fake” essay on the subject of “real” essays
• 3 poems that would make good pets
• 3 instants
• 3 instances
• A dictionary in miniature
• An encyclopedia in miniature
• A thesaurus in miniature
• 1 story that is entirely true
• 1 story that is entirely truthful
• 1 story that is entirely “true”
• A couple good jokes
• 2 fits
• 2 starts

Our submission fees go directly to paying our contributors. Submissions by mail are free. You may mail your work to the address below. 

Artifice

1002 Dean Street, Suite 101

Brooklyn, NY 11238

We accept simultaneous submissions. We do not accept work that has previously been published elsewhere. 

Thank you for sharing your work with us. We look forward to reading it.