The showcase and dissemination of literature created in the Azores will gain a new and unique lease on life. It is entitled Ogygia: Revista Literária (Ogygia: Literary Magazine), and will be available in just over a month.

It is a digital publication that focuses on female writing by giving space to women’s creative expression. However, it is not solely a feminist publication. If anything, it is guided by achievements in gender equality. Above all, it is a place for reading, materialized in a plan that has embraced a motivation of its own.

One of the creators of Ogygia is the accomplished writer and poet Avelina da Silveira, who explains it best:

“The idea for this magazine was conceived because a group of women writers, who were friends, realized that, at the time, there was no literary magazine in Portugal that gave an exclusive voice to women from Portuguese-speaking countries. There are literary magazines and many publishers, but we are not aware of any other that explicitly support women writers. In the beginning, some advocated for the creation of a platform that included men. However, women would run the risk of being (once again) swallowed up by the hegemonic voices of patriarchy. So Paula de Sousa Lima and I decided to go ahead, with the help of Vera Pires, who is excellent at identifying patterns and easily finds typos or errors in texts. The new literary magazine is characterized above all by its demand for quality, combining writing by veteran writers with new literary voices of merit.”

In addition to Avelina da Silveira, the first issue features texts by Irene Maria F. Blayer, Dora Gago, Vera Cymbron, Maria do Rosário Pedreira, Iva Matos, and Leonor Sampaio da Silva, as well as Paula de Sousa Lima, “my partner in this endeavor,” as our interlocutor refers to her. In this first issue of Ogygia, the painter Nina Medeiros contributes not with text but with visual art. “The most obvious aspect is certainly the fact that it is a magazine by women for the world. We are Azorean writers who join our voices to those of women from the Portuguese-speaking world: researchers, poets, chroniclers, fiction writers, translators, book guardians, and a visual artist. They are all highly respected women in their fields of production and as creative people,” she explains.

As for the future of the project, Avelina da Silveira says: “Considering the prevalence of literary talent among Azorean women, we want to promote and publicize these local writers. However, we aspire to be a digital magazine with an international reach. As such, we want to receive contributions from anywhere where someone speaks Portuguese or reflects on the experience of the Portuguese and Azorean diaspora.”

At least for now, the magazine is only available in digital format, more out of necessity than choice. With the seal of approval of the newly formed Moonwater Editions, a local publisher based in Ponta Delgada, which is responsible for the digital publication, Ogygia plans to be a biannual magazine, “published around the autumn and spring equinoxes and remaining a digital magazine because we do not have the financial means to publish it in print, nor the expertise necessary for the distribution of a printed magazine.

We are bold women who have decided to fulfill our dream of facilitating other female writers so that voices in Portuguese can achieve the recognition they deserve. Ogygia: Literary Magazine is the answer in these situations. We publish the work of women whose writing we like, free of charge and without commercial considerations,“ says the mentor and editor of the new publication.

A free digital publication with no commercial considerations, a print edition is not out of the question. But if it happens, it won’t be for now: ”So far, we haven’t received any financial support to cover the costs. But this is also our first issue. After the first issue comes out in September, we plan to apply for cultural funding from the Ponta Delgada City Council and the Regional Government,” admits Avelina da Silveira.

The launch of Ogygia: Revista Literária will take place at the Ponta Delgada Public Library and Regional Archive at 6:30 p.m. on September 18.

In Diário dos Açores, Rui Leite Melo, journalist, Paulo Viveiros, director.

Filamentos, a product of Bruma Publications from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute at Fresno State, congratulates Avelina da Silveira and Paula de Sousa Lima for this important new literary magazine.