Dear M.A.G. Readers and Writers,

Welcome to the first anniversary issue of the M.A.G.

This issue presents the work of over 700 writers. Over 2,000 literary works are in this issue of the MAG. If you have submitted your work and it was not accepted, submit again, either to the MAG or to another journal. Just because I do not accept your work does not mean your work is not publishable. It only means that the work you sent was not MAG material.

For this anniversary issue of the Muse Apprentice Guild, I want to give special thanks to the M.A.G. liaisons who presented contemporary literary work from their respective countries. A warm thank you goes out to Ian McBryde from Australia, Zdravka Evtimova from Bulgaria, Payam Fotouhiyehpour and Dr.Manavaz Alexandrian from Iran, Vahram Martirosyan from Armenia, Karen Alkalay-Gut from Israel and Arlene Ang from Italy.

I also want to extend a warm welcome to the new M.A.G. Editors and Columnists who have joined the staff. Chelsea Rooney heads the new student-writing Department. Amy King heads the new Gay, Lesbian and Queer Department. Terrie Leigh Relf heads the new Ghazal Department. Dr. Willam Doreski presents the new "Doreski Reader" Column. JF Campbell presents the new "Exegesis of the Liminal" Department. Alex Kolker presents the new "Inexhaustible Critic" Column. Michael McIrvin presents the new "Writers' Clinic" Column. Mickey Z. presents the new "Immanent Terrain" Column. Simon Perchik presents the new "SP 101" Column.

If you are a new reader and like what you read in the Muse Apprentice Guild, please share a good thing and tell your friends and colleagues.

If you teach, please consider adding the M.A.G. to your syllabus and join the growing number of professors who are including the Muse Apprentice Guild in their curriculum.

The Muse Apprentice Guild is in a class of its own. You will not find any other other literary quarterly like it anywhere, online or in print.

Hurry and be sure to send me your submissions for the fall issue before the october 15 deadline!.

The Muse Apprentice Guild:
- Answering the question "Does Poetry Matter?",
- Changing the map of the World Of Letters
- Expanding the canon into the 21st Century"

---August Highland

m.a.g.