Letter from the Editor
In the year of “alternative facts” and conspiracy theories, it’s no surprise that the ever-popular simulation hypothesis has gained traction. Under this theory, the world we think we live in is false—it’s actually an artificial computer-world. Here, it’s not simply our politicians lying to us; it’s the very universe itself.
As our world begins to resemble a technological dystopia more, and as less believe in a just God making sure good actions produce good outcomes, the idea that we’re all simply in a simulation—that none of this truly matters—attracts us. Through its absurdity and meaninglessness, the simulation-world offers us comfort. It gives us an excuse. If the news doesn’t matter anyway, if this is all false, we don’t have to feel bad about ignoring its horrors. If after we die we simply fade back into a computer mainframe, numbers in a string, we don’t have to act benevolently or push ourselves towards growth. The simulation is responsible for our worst aspects, not us.
When people don’t go along with what we want from them, we say, “Get with the program.” The simulation, if it exists, lays out all our actions for us, and we cannot deviate. Everything shines on the surface exactly as intended; there is only the surface. We don’t have the free will to exist as something independent of our predetermined actions, all controlled by an anonymous, perhaps alien programmer elsewhere. If we act differently, it’s a glitch.
In putting together this issue, the exact last piece that fit was the cover—a photographical edit from Jonatan Egholm Keis aptly titled “Glitch.” In it, amidst a beautifully harmonious and colorful field of flowers, a boy dressed in pure black glitches. We see then the falseness of the world he’s in; we imagine him seeing it, too, and find it impossible to believe that nothing will change from him seeing the deeper truths of his simulation.
What binds the stories in this issue, despite their vast differences in genre, theme, and content, is that they all glitch. In Jennifer Zhou’s “Here Be Dragons,” a glitch in the otherwise monotonous world of our main character leads to the discovery of an atlas that appears as if by magic, providing evidence of a what-if, a could-have-been. In Annie Rossington’s “Slowly fall shut,” a night spent with someone else in the intimate liminality that late night conversations bring leads the main character to glitch in how she remembers something that has happened to her, leading her to reveal a secret she hasn’t yet been able to admit to herself. In Mackenzie Cook’s “queer love is a car crash,” a night spent on the back of an old truck leads the speaker to glitch out of her own, small world, crashing into someone else and beginning a deeper connection. And, most prominently, in Peter Gofen’s “Lines of Chance,” we explore what it means to see life from our own limited, subjective perspectives, glitching for a moment out of believing that what we see is absolute, recognizing the lines on the carpet as both vertical and horizontal.
In all these pieces, we imagine the characters as changed after their glitches, no longer living their same lives. We imagine the glitches as fundamentally changing the worlds around the characters, around us. We imagine the main decisions of our lives existing in those glitches, sudden realizations that lead us to do better. Even if the world is a simulation, there are moments outside it—moments no computer algorithm could ever explain.
Let this issue be a glitch. Go inside, and find yourself changed.
Courtney Felle
Editor-In-Chief
Marriah Talbott-Malone Prose Editor
Maheen Shahbazi Poetry Editor
In the year of “alternative facts” and conspiracy theories, it’s no surprise that the ever-popular simulation hypothesis has gained traction. Under this theory, the world we think we live in is false—it’s actually an artificial computer-world. Here, it’s not simply our politicians lying to us; it’s the very universe itself.
As our world begins to resemble a technological dystopia more, and as less believe in a just God making sure good actions produce good outcomes, the idea that we’re all simply in a simulation—that none of this truly matters—attracts us. Through its absurdity and meaninglessness, the simulation-world offers us comfort. It gives us an excuse. If the news doesn’t matter anyway, if this is all false, we don’t have to feel bad about ignoring its horrors. If after we die we simply fade back into a computer mainframe, numbers in a string, we don’t have to act benevolently or push ourselves towards growth. The simulation is responsible for our worst aspects, not us.
When people don’t go along with what we want from them, we say, “Get with the program.” The simulation, if it exists, lays out all our actions for us, and we cannot deviate. Everything shines on the surface exactly as intended; there is only the surface. We don’t have the free will to exist as something independent of our predetermined actions, all controlled by an anonymous, perhaps alien programmer elsewhere. If we act differently, it’s a glitch.
In putting together this issue, the exact last piece that fit was the cover—a photographical edit from Jonatan Egholm Keis aptly titled “Glitch.” In it, amidst a beautifully harmonious and colorful field of flowers, a boy dressed in pure black glitches. We see then the falseness of the world he’s in; we imagine him seeing it, too, and find it impossible to believe that nothing will change from him seeing the deeper truths of his simulation.
What binds the stories in this issue, despite their vast differences in genre, theme, and content, is that they all glitch. In Jennifer Zhou’s “Here Be Dragons,” a glitch in the otherwise monotonous world of our main character leads to the discovery of an atlas that appears as if by magic, providing evidence of a what-if, a could-have-been. In Annie Rossington’s “Slowly fall shut,” a night spent with someone else in the intimate liminality that late night conversations bring leads the main character to glitch in how she remembers something that has happened to her, leading her to reveal a secret she hasn’t yet been able to admit to herself. In Mackenzie Cook’s “queer love is a car crash,” a night spent on the back of an old truck leads the speaker to glitch out of her own, small world, crashing into someone else and beginning a deeper connection. And, most prominently, in Peter Gofen’s “Lines of Chance,” we explore what it means to see life from our own limited, subjective perspectives, glitching for a moment out of believing that what we see is absolute, recognizing the lines on the carpet as both vertical and horizontal.
In all these pieces, we imagine the characters as changed after their glitches, no longer living their same lives. We imagine the glitches as fundamentally changing the worlds around the characters, around us. We imagine the main decisions of our lives existing in those glitches, sudden realizations that lead us to do better. Even if the world is a simulation, there are moments outside it—moments no computer algorithm could ever explain.
Let this issue be a glitch. Go inside, and find yourself changed.
Courtney Felle
Editor-In-Chief
Marriah Talbott-Malone Prose Editor
Maheen Shahbazi Poetry Editor