The Megaphone

Author: Bryson Huang

In this installment of Megaphone’s Student Spotlight Series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Tree Ring Literary, a youth-led magazine built on trust and authenticity. With me is Medha, a founder of Tree Ring Literary.

Q1. Tree Ring Literary is described as a youth-led magazine founded by former Savoir Revue staff, built on trust and authenticity. What specific experiences from Savoir Revue shaped your vision for Tree Ring Literary’s editorial and community approach?

Savoir Revue was a magazine that had a really bad editor in chief unfortunately. He closed down the magazine abruptly because of his actions. So I would say that we try to be as different as we can be from Savoir Revue. The EIC used to use AI for work and task all the staff writers with heavy work every week and end up not publishing it. We aim to do exactly the opposite of that.

We’re very much involved in the community and make sure to be respectful to all when interacting with them.

Q2. What inspired you to center your first issue on “dreams”, and how has this focus shaped the works in this issue?

Dreams was my idea (Medha). Personally, I love dreaming. It’s like a free movie you can watch every time you sleep. I can make up anything about my friends, family and more. So that’s why I wanted to know what other people thought of dreams. Dreams can have different interpretations and it was lovely to see everyone’s creative works on it.

Q3. Have you encountered any submissions that surprised or transformed your thinking about the magazine’s theme?

Oh yes! We had a beautiful piece that talked about the clock ticking all the time and showing how time flies before our dreams become reality. We need to seize the moment and achieve our dreams. It was really eye opening to me.

Q4. What is one moment in the magazine’s journey so far that has felt meaningful or impactful for your team?

There are too many moments to be honest. The best “we made it” moment was probably when you asked to interview us! We were also very happy when we hit 1K followers and released our first issue. And we always have our little wins whenever any magazine features us without us asking for it.

Q5. What advice would you give to new literary editors or writers looking to launch their own publication or get published for the first time?

I would advise you to never be afraid to share your work. If you wrote something and it was from the heart, never think that it’s bad. And never get demotivated after a rejection. Take it as an opportunity to improve. And finally, keep writing and have fun in the process.

Thank you so much to Tree Ring Literary for joining us in this interview! Make sure to check out their work here: https://linktr.ee/TreeRingLiterary?utm_source=linktree_profile_share&ltsid=361059a7-c3ad-470e-8144-c373a5d2bd58