The Moth Magazine
@themothmagazine.bsky.social
International art & lit magazine. One of the world's biggest prizes for a poem. Short story, nature writing & art prizes. Also: @thecaterpillarmag
Good luck to anyone trying to catch the solar eclipse today! 🌞 Painting by Howard Russell Butler
❛ Against the sustained tick of a watch, fiction takes the measure of a life, a season, a look exchanged, the turning point, desire as brief as a dream, the grief and terror that after childhood we cease to express. Mavis Gallant, born #OTD in 1922.
Awarded annually to unpublished pieces of prose or poetry, The Moth Nature Writing Prize celebrates work which best combines exceptional literary merit with an exploration of the writers’ relationship with the natural world. Closing 30 September. t.co/iVMwxZTHWK
❛ The very nicest thing about being a writer is that you can afford to indulge yourself endlessly with oddness, and nobody can really do anything about it, as long as you keep writing and kind of using it up, as it were. Shirley Jackson, who died #OTD in 1965.
❛ Time was hungry – / bicycles, horses, carriages moving / at God's speed. What perforated / the hours but our own machine hands? Time to clock off with Kit Fan's 'Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory'.
❛ Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art. Andy Warhol, born #OTD in 1928.
❛ I need a few months to live scuzzy to finish a book, you know, to not wash my hair, to just sit in the same room for hours and eat with my hands... From our interview with author Claire Kilroy, originally in Issue 13.
From the #MothArchives, 'The Return of Ultraman' by artist Daniela Uhlig, which featured on the cover of Issue 37, in Summer 2019. 🚀
❛ You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can't, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world. James Baldwin, born #OTD in 1924.
❛ I skim the serious American journals where I send work, but I actually read The Moth... My friend the nun is shocked, I think, by the work… but she is reading it too, in her Italian cloister. She is probably praying for you. – A reader themothmagazine.com/moth-shop 🧡
Have you entered The Moth Nature Writing Prize yet? We want to hear from you! 🌱 1st prize €1,000 and a week at The Moth Retreat 🌱2nd prize €500 🌱 3rd prize €250 Open worldwide to anyone over 16. Visit our website for more details... themothmagazine.com/directory/mo...
❛ If you stand here and inhale it you'll realise / that yes, the air has sweetness, dead things and history in it / but it's November first, and this air has winter in it Sarah Clancy, 'Harvesting Underwater' and artwork by Tazia Fawley, from Issue 17
❛ I’ve never liked housework. I get by doing little chores when I feel like them, in between painting. Who wants to chase dust all their life?... If the house looks dirty, buy another bunch of flowers, is my advice. Margaret Olley, who died #OTD in 2011.
'Sublimely quiet, inspirational setting and the owners are amongst the nicest people I’ve ever met!’ Jo Withers, author If you're looking for a room of one's own to work on your creative project, The Moth Retreat could be just the place... themothmagazine.com/directory/mo...
❛ Maybe I am not very human - all I ever wanted to do was to paint sunlight on the side of a house. Painter Edward Hopper, born #OTD in 1882.
❛ A lot of poems start in Oz. I like going to Oz but I want to be taken there. From Issue 19, our interview with poet Billy Collins.
Calling all writers! This year's Moth Nature Writing Prize is now open – we're looking for original submissions of poetry and prose from around the world. Closing 30 September: themothmagazine.com/directory/mo... 🌿 Painting by Victor Man from #MothArchives
❛ I am for an art that takes its form from the lines of life itself, that twists and extends and accumulates and spits and drips, and is heavy and coarse and blunt and sweet and stupid as life itself. Sculptor Claes Oldenberg, who died #OTD in 2022.
❛ The sun seeps above the kitchen sink, / folding out on the blinds like a Swedish flat-pack sunset. 'Redwood // Pacific' by George Neame - originally from Issue 36. 🍊 #MothArchives
❛ I used to think I was the strangest person in the world but then I thought there are so many people in the world, there must be someone just like me... it’s true I'm here, and I’m just as strange as you. Frida Kahlo, who died #OTD in 1954.
❛ Slender, neat and unpretentious in design... The interviews read often like craft-packed mini-memoirs. The poems and stories are consistently gripping, pertinent, stirring. – Dan O'Brien Past Moths from just €5 💚 themothmagazine.com/moth-shop
❛ I think I was just always extremely naively optimistic about what I could personally achieve... probably better that I didn’t understand how the industry was structured. I didn’t know enough to be intimidated by it. From our interview with Sally Rooney. #MothArchives
Too warm outside for anything else... Elisa Filomena's 'Ragazzo che fuma', from the cover of Issue 43 🌇 #MothArchives
❛ Novels teach you that actions have consequences. They help you grow up. Dame Hilary Mantel, born #OTD in 1952. 📸 by Dudley Reed
In case you missed it... The Moth Nature Writing Prize is now open! ✨️ 1st prize €1,000 and a week at The Moth Retreat ✨️ 2nd prize €500 ✨️ 3rd prize €250 Open worldwide to anyone over 16. Visit our website for more details... themothmagazine.com/directory/mo...
❛ The purpose of poetry is to remind us how difficult it is to remain just one person, for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors, and invisible guests come in and out at will. Czesław Miłosz, born #OTD in 1911.
