Second-years Jonathan Chung, Sophie Salvato, and Brent DeVries have revived The Midway Review, a campus literary journal featuring essays, two years after its last publication in winter 2018. The Midway Review, which went on hiatus after its previous editors graduated without trained successors, is currently accepting submissions for its next issue this spring. Chung, Salvato, and DeVries are its new editors-in-chief.
Chung came across The Midway Review’s Facebook page when looking at RSO options this fall, and thought it was an essential forum for the intellectual curiosity on campus that he wanted to see published again. “It really gives me a sense of the intellectual diversity on campus because it’s a great way for people to put their thoughts on paper in a longer format,” Chung said.
After learning that the publication folded in 2018, Chung contacted the magazine’s faculty sponsor Malynne Sternstein, the chair of the fundamentals program. Sternstein then connected Chung, Salvato, and DeVries to the previous editors Rosemarie Ho (A.B. ’18), Anna Christensen (A.B. ’18), and Elisabeth Huh (A.B. ’17) for guidance on reviving the paper.
Ho and Christensen were able to put the new editors in contact with the magazine’s previous printing service and give them access to The Midway Review’s website and email account. Upon accessing the publication’s email, the editors found two years’ worth of submissions from students across demographics and the globe; authors included students of the College, Princeton graduate students, a University of Toronto student, and students from India and Turkey. This discovery encouraged the editors to expand the publication.
The Midway Review has lived many lives. The first incarnation was a conservative student publication, until the name was adopted by the fundamentals program as a “student-run, nonpartisan political magazine,” The Maroon reported in a 2006 article. “It had become a magazine for students who wanted to write and read thoughtful criticism. That really is, I think, the best thing the Review can do moving forward—continuing that tradition of lively, interesting essays,” Ho said.
The new editors plan to continue this tradition with quarterly publications. The Midway Review is accepting pieces from the public to publish this spring. Essays will be accepted on any topic, including but not limited to politics, literature and film, history, philosophy, and religion. “The only criteria is that [the essays] are well thought out, well written, and not academic. Any topic that you’re passionate about, no matter what it is, please consider submitting,” Chung said.
