Gandy Dancer reviews The Common, noting that “underneath the contemporary feel of the journal is a charming thread of worldly tradition.”
Browse a list of the ten most-read new pieces of 2025 to get a taste of what left an impact on readers. 2025 was a momentous year for The Common: our fifteenth anniversary, our 30th issue, even a major motion picture based on a story in the magazine.
CASEY WALKER
But don’t misunderstand: these are funny books, not cynical ones, and they are tight and propulsive, not sagging or perambulatory. There’s always a dignity to continuing to pursue your errands, however fruitless. You meet a lot of oddballs along the way, for one.
ELSA LYONS
A book-length essay divided in nine parts, it’s a barrage of generalizations—but generalizations rendered in startlingly precise prose. Concepts that explode into cascades of images. El Laberinto is not a prose poem. But Paz, first and foremost a poet, can’t help but see words the way a poet does.
Don’t miss an issue! Subscribe to The Common.