On September 27th, Full Stop will publish its first-ever book, titled, fittingly, Full Stop: The Book. Collecting the best work of our first five years, the book will help support Full Stop’s goal of paying young writers for expansive, interesting, and often strange literary criticism. The journey over the past five years has not been an easy one. There’s been some.. resentment, to say the least. To celebrate the release of the book next week, we’re releasing some material from the book online. Here’s one of the book’s two introductions. You can pre-order the book here

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We hope you’re happy. Full Stop is a web publication, found conveniently, and freely, on the internet. And yet all you people out there seem to care about is books. “When are you going to really start publishing?” our former professors ask. “When are you going to thank me in the front matter?” our mothers ask. “When are you going to find a place?” our fathers ask, refusing to lower the newspaper and look us in our hungry, bloodshot eyes. Well, here you go. Here’s your precious book. We hope it keeps you warm in the dark days to come.

This collection of our greatest hits should be cause for celebration, a time to look on our creation as a contented, loving god and judge it good. Instead, we find ourselves consumed by resentment. We started Full Stop with the humble goal of creating a sustainable ecology for online criticism, a digital hub for the literary discussions of the future, but five years later, here we are, self-publishing a bunch of paper that will inevitably be relegated to toilet tanks in dormitories and nursing homes across this once-great nation. So how did we get here? Let us explain.

Stage 1: Denial

“How could Full Stop be self-publishing a book,” you ask? Believe us, we asked ourselves, and countless others, the same question. How could nobody want to publish the best content from the site that first translated Pussy Riot into English? That has featured National Book Award winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, and Grabby Award winners? “Didn’t Jonathan Franzen once reference them on NPR?” you ask. And didn’t you hear that we review more translated fiction and small press works than any site not run by a man named Michael Orthofer? Weren’t we recently called the lone voice in the wilderness, whispering in the world’s weary ear that literary fiction shall live? No. We weren’t.

Stage 2: Anger

Like Nixon’s, our anger is not a finite resource. We’re angry when our competitors get articles written about them in newspapers of record. Or profiled in glossy magazines. Or invited to sit on high-minded panels. Or blurbed by old New Leftists as carrying the torch of adversarial, culturally enriching public discourse. We gnash our teeth when we hear stories of them meeting models, or having celebrities in their corners, or being handed free drugs. They seem to be generally happier, more toned, and better groomed individuals, each of which is correlated with a longer, more fulfilling life. If we were just a bit smarter, or healthier in mind and spirit, we’d find better things to occupy our thoughts. But to the consternation of our loved ones, we haven’t. That’s why it gives us a sick sense of satisfaction when our competitors, many of whom have every advantage in the world, fail. It validates our own formidable aversion to networking and glad-handing and softens the blow we feel every time somebody says they’ve heard of Full Stop.

Stage 3: Bargaining

How many small press books have we shined our light on after they’ve gone unnoticed by mainstream outlets? How many lowly scribblers have we illuminated before they’ve passed into eternal obscurity? How many fellow writers have we pointed our laser pen at, just to entertain our cat? They need us. They owe us. And they’ll pay. One way or another, they’ll pay.

Stage 4: Depression

What the hell is wrong with us? All this misplaced resentment. It’s not Isaac Fitzgerald’s fault that we can’t figure out social media. It’s not Marvin Krislov’s fault that we didn’t go to an Ivy League university with more money in the bank than Serbia. It’s only our own sick pride that has prevented us from making the rounds, from taking the steps that are completely within our means to ensure we don’t spiral into oblivion. But instead, we sulk. “Nothing ventured, nothing lost,” we tell ourselves. Pathetic.

We don’t deserve you. Stop reading right now. No, don’t worry about us. We’ll be alright. Get out of here! Can’t you see we don’t want you anymore? Why can’t you go back where you came from? Now, leave us alone! Go. Go!

Stage 5: Acceptance

Full Stop is the government in exile only recognized by a few failing Baltic states. It’s the minor league manager realizing, as he watches his players flip through porno mags on the bench, that he’s never going to coach in the bigs. It’s the tab that you always have open but never read, until your browser crashes and loses it forever.

But just because these things are marginal, that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. History is an unwritten book, you know? Emily Dickinson didn’t become famous until she was dead, right? And didn’t Melville live in his mom’s house too? And if you think about it, at some point, everybody dies. And though our bodies will inevitably decay into plant food and animal food and human food ad infinitum, HTML is forever, isn’t it?

So we take it all back, and would like to re-commit ourselves to literary culture. We believe in and love the aggregators, publicists, and especially grant-giving organizations. To the independently wealthy, we welcome you with open arms. International syndicates looking to launder money, we are a fully recognized 501(c)(3), able to discreetly accept tax-deductible donations. And of course, anyone reading this book, thank you. You, specifically you, are why we have been able to do what we love for the past five years.

—The Editors

PS: Thanks, Mom.


 
 
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