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Island magazine

Literary, arts and culture magazine Island publishes new fiction, essays, artworks and poetry from around the world. Based in Hobart, Tasmania.

23/07/2025

"‘When does Noah in Systems get back from leave?’ Tony asked. No one knew. Benjamin wrote, ‘Noah (Systems) leave?’ and put one neat asterisk beside it. He realised he was also not sure what ‘Systems’ meant, who Noah was, or what the broader purpose of the company and his place in it might be. He was about to draw another asterisk when the pen slipped out of his hand.
‘Benjamin, you seem to have turned into a large frog,’ said Kate. ‘But did you get those briefs approved by Rob yet?’"

We've all been there. Read Angus Macdonald's 'Why Benjamin Stork broke the ribbit glass' at islandmag.com/read
Image: Jack Hamilton - Unsplash

20/07/2025

"Diane Arbus said, ‘The farther afield you go, the more you are going home.’ I’ve always felt this. Like all of the plans I’ve made (under direction from parents, school, jobs, books, common sense) have meant nothing. That I’ve never come close to whatever I’ve been aiming at. This, of course, is the pre-requisite for becoming a writer, a person who invents as an attempt (always unsuccessful) to answer this question. What am I aiming at? But it’s not limited to creative people. Millions of us drift, little Celeste-type bodies bobbing over the ocean until someone finds our empty shell, wonders how it got there, what happened to the people inside."

Read Stephen Orr's 'The more you are going home' at islandmag.com/read

Image: The National Library of Norway

18/07/2025

Some fantastic first pages from Island #174, on sale now. Can't wait to read the rest (or even this bit, at a reasonable size)? Grab a digital subscription or single issue at islandmag.com/shop

16/07/2025

"He had wanted to be adored, her husband. He had wanted to be Mr. Worldwide. Now, he was a dinner table." Follow Riga's adventures in voyeurism and automatic writing in Alex Bennetts' surreal story, "New purpose", free to read at islandmag.com/read

Image by Rodion Kutsaiev/Unsplash

11/07/2025

"She is coming to haunt us –
an ascending angel, serrated black pillow slip,
her beacon dim as her starblind eyes
She belongs to another world, a night away, swimming closer
for one last gasp..."

Descend to the deep with Siobhan Hodge's new poem, Anglerfish, at islandmag.com/read

Image: Museums Victoria

05/07/2025

"Fifty years and four generations to arrive.
The smell of coffee mingled with diesel
disorients. A train rumbles in the distance.
The morning is 11 degrees and a chorus
of barks. Countless strays wander these streets"

Read Lesh Karan's evocative essay on a first trip to India, 'Inaugural visit: snapshot': islandmag.com/read

Image by Ali Al-Sheiba - Unsplash

04/07/2025

Are you thinking of entering our Nature Writing Prize? Get some great tips at our online nature writing panel this Wednesday. Join Laura Jean McKay, Sharleigh Crittenden and James Bradley at 6pm on 9 July. Register at https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gwWci0loSH6FloIPU3rqIQ #/registration, or find out more at islandmag.com/events

Sharleigh Crittenden is a Wiradjuri writer, researcher and mother living and writing on Wangal Country. Her short story ‘River Fish’ won the 2023 First Nations Storytelling Prize and her poem ‘Narrowboats’ was shortlisted for in the 2024 Nakata Brophy Prize. Her work has been published in Island, Portside Review and The Rumpus, among others. She is currently working on her debut novel.

Laura Jean McKay is the author of The Animals in That Country - winner of the Arthur C Clarke Award, The Victorian Prize for Literature, the ABIA Small Publishers Adult Book of the Year and the Aurealis Award. Laura is also the author of Holiday in Cambodia and Gunflower. She is the 2025 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Fellow, Ireland, and teaches Creative Writing at Massey University.

James Bradley is a writer and critic whose Deep Water: The World in the Ocean, won the 2025 NSW Premier’s Award for Non-Fiction and a Gold Medal in the 2025 Nautilus Awards. He is an Honorary Associate at the Sydney Environment Institute at the University of Sydney and his latest novel, Landfall, is published by Penguin.

27/06/2025

Join us online on Wednesday 9 July at 6pm as we discuss all things nature writing with Laura Jean McKay, Sharleigh Crittenden and James Bradley. This panel should be full of ideas for anyone planning to submit to our brand-new Nature Writing Prize, so come along and get your imagination working. Register at https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gwWci0loSH6FloIPU3rqIQ #/registration, or find out more at islandmag.com/events

Sharleigh Crittenden is a Wiradjuri writer, researcher and mother living and writing on Wangal Country. Her short story ‘River Fish’ won the 2023 First Nations Storytelling Prize and her poem ‘Narrowboats’ was shortlisted for in the 2024 Nakata Brophy Prize. Her work has been published in Island, Portside Review and The Rumpus, among others. She is currently working on her debut novel.

Laura Jean McKay is the author of The Animals in That Country - winner of the Arthur C Clarke Award, The Victorian Prize for Literature, the ABIA Small Publishers Adult Book of the Year and the Aurealis Award. Laura is also the author of Holiday in Cambodia and Gunflower. She is the 2025 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Fellow, Ireland, and teaches Creative Writing at Massey University.

James Bradley is a writer and critic whose Deep Water: The World in the Ocean, won the 2025 NSW Premier’s Award for Non-Fiction and a Gold Medal in the 2025 Nautilus Awards. He is an Honorary Associate at the Sydney Environment Institute at the University of Sydney and his latest novel, Landfall, is published by Penguin.

26/06/2025

"Nerys sent another jewelled fruit cake this year with an invitation to spend the holidays with her in Ullapool. Kind of her to remember me and who knows? One day I might go. They’re tearing down all the tenements in Caledonia Road to build high-rise flats. If they continue with all the other streets there might not be anywhere else to go. Improving the area. One can but laugh..."
Keith Goh Johnson inhabits a narrow-minded Scottish spinster looking to expand her horizons with the new locum doctor in 'Improving the area', at islandmag.com/read
Image by Annie Spratt

23/06/2025

I know you in the brine-infused sea
an open wound that carries you away
into aquamarine photographs bouncing
between satellites before beamed
to my bed...

New poetry from Scott-Patrick Mitchell; 'My fisherman' is at islandmag.com/read

Image by Michael Held

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▼Ideas. Writing. Culture.

Island is a not-for-profit print-only magazine of essays, short stories, poetry and art.

Since 1979 we have been celebrating ideas, writing and culture from our base in Hobart, Tasmania. We value variety and excellence, publishing new, emerging and established writers from mainland Australia and overseas as well as from Tasmania. We advocate for excellent writing and for the joys and benefits of reading.