We mostly publish non-fiction, and this can take the form of essays, memoir, reportage, visual essays (collections of images from a particular artist) and Q&As. These nonfiction pieces always respond to theme of the edition in which they appear. We also publish fiction and poetry, although these genres are untethered from the edition theme – our guiding principle here is simply, ‘Do we love it?’

For spelling and grammar, we follow the Macquarie Dictionary and our own in-house style guide – you can request a copy if, like us, you enjoy reading about capitalisation rules, numbering conventions and other exciting style points. We also use British/Australian English spelling and punctuation. But if you’re submitting a piece or if you’ve been commissioned to write for us, don’t worry – our crack copyeditors will apply our house style to your work so that you don’t have to!

We don’t include references in the print edition, but if you’ve got a reference list for your piece and feel that it’s useful for readers to know what sources you’ve consulted, we can publish that references list in the online version of your piece. This means that we don’t use footnotes or endnotes.

We also don’t expect you to include in-text citations in your piece – for example, if you’re quoting Mark Fisher, we’d prefer you to write something like In the words of the great Mark Fisher, ‘capital is an abstract parasite’ rather than In the words of the great Mark Fisher (2009), ‘capital is an abstract parasite’ (p. xx).

You’re free to quote other sources in your work, but please make sure that any and all quotes and attributions are accurate.

While we curate each print edition loosely around a particular theme, GR Online is different. Here, no subject need be off limits from your critical and analytical eye – in the past year, we’ve published work on femvertising, artwashing, superhero movies, self-help, dreams in fiction, bookshops, faith and sexuality, and the pleasures of open call-outs. Our online essays are on the shorter side – no more than 1,500 words – but they’ll always spark a great conversation.  

 Better yet, every GR Online piece is free to read – you don’t need to be a subscriber to enjoy all this glorious content. 

 What we’re looking for  

• new perspectives on contemporary issues and challenges 
• commentary, analysis and original critique 
• short essays or reflections that use a personal slant to explore wider subjects. 

 What we’re not looking for  

• fiction 
• academic articles disguised as think-pieces  
• an overly serious or earnest point of view. 

Editorial process 

From the time we receive your draft piece, our turnaround time for publication is about one week –we’ll copyedit your draft and send it back to you, you’ll send your revised version back to us, we’ll proofread and then publish it. If you haven’t written for us before, we’ll also ask you to send us a headshot and a short (50 words or so) bio. 

When it comes to spelling, grammar and other style points, our crack copyeditors will apply our house style to your work so that you don’t have to. You can always request a copy of our style guide if you, like us, enjoy reading about things like capitalisation rules and numbering conventions. 

We publish around once a fortnight (don’t set your clock by it), and we promote our online pieces in our weekly newsletter, Great Reads. We’d love it if you also shared your piece (via social media, megaphone, carrier pigeon, however you like) – all our online content is in front of the paywall. 

Payment 

We pay a flat rate of $500 per online piece. 

• Fiction and non-fiction commissioned for the print edition is paid at AUD$0.75 per word.
• Poetry is paid at AUD$200 per poem.
• Work commissioned for GR Online is paid at AUD$500 per piece.

Since we receive thousands of submissions every year and have limited space and budget, we're not able to consider or respond to unsolicited submissions that are emailed to us directly. If you've got a piece or a pitch you'd like to send our way, please submit it via Submittable during a call-out window.