For seventeen years, Chautauqua has been a joint print publication between Chautauqua Institution and the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Department of Creative Writing— each volume a manifestation of the values and aesthetics of the Institution, a portable Chautauqua season between covers, loosely reflecting the experiences of those nine summer weeks through the voices of talented writers.

Starting in fall 2025, Chautauqua will become an independent literary journal sourced at UNCW. It will remain under the same editorial team led by Jill Gerard. Our habits will remain the same. What we have long called “the Chautauqua way” reflects our process: graduate and undergraduate students in the Department of Creative Writing work as members of the editorial team, guided by professional editors and an advisory board. Together we read and discuss submissions, fact check and edit, search for art, and participate in the artistic process of publishing a literary journal.

We greatly appreciate the support we have had from Chautauqua Institution, and we will continue to honor the traditions and standards we’ve set for our readers, writers, and members of the literary community.

As we move to a completely online publication, we strive to encourage and celebrate diverse literary voices, both new and established. We will cultivate an attitude of hope, inspiring writers to engage in the liberating power and joy of stories, essays, and poems.

Check back. Visit our website for more announcements, Look Back features, and other fun posts. And get ready for our next edition. This edition will feature a collection of works pulled from our issues over the past seventeen years, focusing on the theme of hope. Look for this inaugural publication in December 2025.

We will reopen submissions in the fall--reading for the Spring 2026 issue. Check back in late September for more information.