McSweeney’s began in 1998 as a literary journal, edited by Dave Eggers, that published only works rejected by other magazines. But after the first issue, the journal began to publish pieces primarily written with McSweeney’s in mind. Since then, it has attracted works from some of the finest writers in the country, including Denis Johnson, William T. Vollmann, Rick Moody, Joyce Carol Oates, Heidi Julavits, Jonathan Lethem, Michael Chabon, Ben Marcus, Susan Straight, Roddy Doyle, T. C. Boyle, Steven Millhauser, Gabe Hudson, Robert Coover, Ann Beattie, and many others. Today, McSweeney’s has grown to be one of the country’s best-read and most-widely circulated literary journals, with an expanding, loyal subscriber base and strong independent bookstore following. As a small publishing house, McSweeney’s is committed to finding new voices — Gabe Hudson, Paul Collins, Neal Pollack, J. T. Leroy, John Hodgman, Amy Fusselman, Salvador Plascencia, and Sean Wilsey are among those whose early work appeared in McSweeney’s — and promoting the work of gifted but underappreciated writers, such as Lydia Davis and Stephen Dixon.
