failbetter is a quarterly online literary magazine.

Founding

Founded in 2000 by Thom Didato and David McLendon, the magazine originally evolved from a Brooklyn-based reading series that featured many writers from the Gordon Lish

Gordon Lish

Gordon Jay Lish is an American writer. As a literary editor, he championed many American authors, particularly Raymond Carver, Barry Hannah, Amy Hempel, and Richard Ford.-Early life and family:...

 school of writing. McLendon left failbetter in 2003 to pursue his own writing and subsequently found the literary magazine, Unsaid. Andrew Day, who had helped design the initial issues, then came back to the fold as the magazine's Managing Editor. Subsequently, failbetters staff of editors, consultants and readers grew.

History

Since its inception, failbetter has been online quarterly magazine published in the spirit of a traditional literary journal--dedicated to featuring quality fiction, poetry and artwork. In the span of just 5 years, failbetter (whose name was inspired by Beckett: "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.") quickly garnered its readership by publishing up-and-coming writers like Sam Lipsyte

Sam Lipsyte

Sam Lipsyte is an American novelist and short story writer.The son of the sports journalist Robert Lipsyte, Sam Lipsyte was born in New York City and raised in Closter, New Jersey...

, Heidi Julavits

Heidi Julavits

Heidi Suzanne Julavits is an American author and co-editor of The Believer magazine. She has been published in The Best Creative Nonfiction Vol. 2, Esquire, Story, Zoetrope All-Story, and McSweeney’s Quarterly...

, Myla Goldberg

Myla Goldberg

Myla Goldberg is an American novelist and musician.-Biography:Goldberg was born into a Jewish family. She was raised in Laurel, Maryland, and graduated from Eleanor Roosevelt High School. She majored in English at Oberlin College, graduating in 1993...

, and the late Amanda Davis

Amanda Davis

Amanda Davis was an American writer. She released one collection, Circling the Drain, and one novel, Wonder When You'll Miss Me. Davis died at the age of 32 in a plane crash; the plane was piloted by her father and crashed on Old Fort Mountain in McDowell County, North Carolina. She had just...

. Additionally, the magazine interviewed many of the best literary voices of the day, including Paul Auster

Paul Auster

Paul Benjamin Auster is an American author known for works blending absurdism, existentialism, crime fiction and the search for identity and personal meaning in works such as The New York Trilogy , Moon Palace , The Music of Chance , The Book of Illusions and The Brooklyn Follies...

, Charles Baxter, T.C. Boyle, Nick Hornby

Nick Hornby

Nick Hornby is an English novelist, essayist and screenwriter. He is best known for the novels High Fidelity, About a Boy, and for the football memoir Fever Pitch. His work frequently touches upon music, sport, and the aimless and obsessive natures of his protagonists.-Life and career:Hornby was...

, Pam Houston, Billy Collins

Billy Collins

Billy Collins is an American poet, appointed as Poet Laureate of the United States from 2001 to 2003. He is a Distinguished Professor at Lehman College of the City University of New York and is the Senior Distinguished Fellow of the Winter Park Institute, Florida...

, Jonathan Lethem

Jonathan Lethem

Jonathan Allen Lethem is an American novelist, essayist and short story writer. His first novel, Gun, with Occasional Music, a genre work that mixed elements of science fiction and detective fiction, was published in 1994. It was followed by three more science fiction novels...

, Marie Ponsot, George Saunders

George Saunders

George Saunders is a New York Times bestselling American writer of short stories, essays, novellas and children's books. His writing has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, McSweeney's and GQ, among other publications...

, Anne Tyler

Anne Tyler

Anne Tyler is an American novelist.Tyler, the eldest of four children, was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her father was a chemist and her mother a social worker. Her early childhood was spent in a succession of Quaker communities in the mountains of North Carolina and in Raleigh...

 and others. The magazine was also fortunate to interview back-to-back Pulitzer

Pulitzer Prize

The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...

 winners Michael Chabon

Michael Chabon

Michael Chabon born May 24, 1963) is an American author and "one of the most celebrated writers of his generation", according to The Virginia Quarterly Review....

 and Richard Russo

Richard Russo

Richard Russo is an American novelist, short story writer, screenwriter, and teacher.-Early life and education:Russo was born in Johnstown, New York, and raised in nearby Gloversville...

 months before each won the award.

On-Line Journal

Initially, the traditional literary establishment was somewhat suspect of the merit of online literary magazines (see literary magazines). failbetter is one of many quality online literary publications that have successfully broken that barrier. The magazine was one of the first online publications to be recognized by such annual print award anthologies as the Pushcart Prize

Pushcart Prize

The Pushcart Prize is an American literary prize by Pushcart Press that honors the best "poetry, short fiction, essays or literary whatnot" published in the small presses over the previous year. Magazine and small book press editors are invited to nominate up to 6 works they have featured....

 as well as The Best American Poetry series. failbetter is also included in the LOCKSS

LOCKSS

The LOCKSS project, under the auspices of Stanford University, develops and supports an open source system allowing libraries to collect, preserve and provide their readers with access to material published on the Web. The system attempts to replicate the way libraries do this for material...

international archive system.

As of the fall of 2007 the average readership was over 60,000 per issue.