2012 Pushcart Prize Rankings (Fiction)

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It is that time of year again. My copy of the 2012 Pushcart Prize Anthology arrived in the mail yesterday and I have been updating the rankings. I will start with the list for Fiction. The updated Non-fiction list is here.

I feel compelled every year to offer a disclaimer for the list. I originally created it in order to aid my own efforts at targeting my submissions of short stories to literary magazines. I used the Pushcart Prize because I felt that it represented the broadest range of magazines among the annual prizes (including Best American Short Stories and the O. Henry Awards).

My method is straightforward. I use a ten-year rolling database and award points to magazines for the prizes awarded and fewer points for each special mention. I don't go further back than ten years because it seems to me that what is relevant is the current success of the magazines, not their storied past. Also, the further back we go, the more defunct magazines we find, and that's not terribly helpful. Some have argued that a five-year period should be chosen instead. That seems too small a sample. When only 19 or 20 prizes are awarded in fiction each year, I think ten years provides a clearer picture of a magazine's success.

Some people don't like rankings at all, and I understand that. This ranking, however, is as objective as I can make it. The Pushcart Prize itself is subjective, of course, but that's an entirely different question.

A note on symbols. I have marked magazines that I believe to have ceased publication with ©. Several magazines have a (?) by their name which means I can't find a website for them. Please leave any corrections in the comments.

What is notable about this year's list? Here are some observations:

• Ploughshares maintains a sizable lead
• Tin House moves into 2nd place, jumping over Conjunctions and Zoetrope, which are tied for 3rd
• Georgia Review, on top of the charts for non-fiction, climbs 5 spots to #6, and Paris Review falls into a tie for 9th with the defunct Ontario Review, while Epoch drops out of the top ten.
• Both One Story and A Public Space make big moves up on the back of a double win for each (matched by Georgia Review)

So, here is the list:

Pushcart Prize Ranking (Fiction) for 2012

2012	Magazine	2012 Score
1	Ploughshares	103
2	Tin House	74
3	Conjunctions	72
3	Zoetrope: All Story	72
5	Southern Review	63
6	Georgia Review	54
7	Threepenny Review	50
8	One Story	48
9	Ontario Review ©	46
9	Paris Review	46
11	Epoch	45
12	McSweeney's	42
12	New England Review	42
14	A Public Space	41
15	Kenyon Review	40
16	Five Points	34
16	Missouri Review	34
18	TriQuarterly	33
19	Boulevard	30
19	New Letters	30
19	Noon	30
19	Shenandoah	30
23	Antioch Review	29
23	Witness	29
25	Agni	28
26	Virginia Quarterly Review	27
27	StoryQuarterly	23
28	Mississippi Review	22
28	Sun	22
30	Gettysburg Review	21
30	Prairie Schooner	21
32	Iowa Review	20
33	Ecotone	19
34	Glimmer Train	18
35	Bellevue Literary Review	17
36	Michigan Quarterly Review	16
37	Colorado Review	15
38	Crazyhorse	14
39	Idaho Review	13
39	Willow Springs	13
39	Yale Review	13
39	ZYZZYVA	13
43	Alaska Quarterly Review	11
43	American Scholar	11
43	American Short Fiction	11
43	Harvard Review	11
43	Hudson Review	11
48	Narrative	10
48	Salmagundi	10
50	Chelsea ©	9
50	Image	9
50	Oxford American	9
50	Third Coast	9
54	Calyx	8
54	Cincinnati Review	8
54	Post Road	8
57	Manoa	7
57	Pen America	7
57	Speakeasy ©	7
57	Water-Stone Review	7
61	Caribbean Writer	6
61	Fence	6
61	Massachusetts Review	6
61	Mid American Review	6
61	New Orleans Review	6
61	News from the Republic of Letters	6
61	North American Review	6
61	Sonora Review	6
69	Black Renaissance Noire	5
69	Bridge ©	5
69	Coffee House Press	5
69	Grand Street ©	5
69	Indiana Review	5
69	Parkett	5
69	Pleiades	5
69	Raritan	5
69	Southwest Review	5
69	Univ. of Georgia Press	5
69	Little Star	5
80	Beloit Fiction	4
80	Black Warrior Review	4
80	Daedalus	4
80	Fiction International	4
80	Hopkins Review	4
80	Northwest Review	4
80	Other Voices ©	4
80	Sewanee Review	4
88	Another Chicago Magazine	3
88	Appalachian Heritage	3
88	Doubletake ©	3
88	Event	3
88	failbetter.com	3
88	Fiction	3
88	Graywolf Press	3
88	New York Tyrant	3
88	Ninth Letter	3
88	Pinch Literary Journal	3
88	River Styx	3
88	West Branch	3
88	Western Humanities Review	3
101	[sic]	2
101	American Letters & Commentary	2
101	American Literary Review	2
101	Bamboo Ridge	2
101	Bellingham Review	2
101	BkMk Press	2
101	Blackbird	2
101	Boston Review	2
101	Briar Cliff Review	2
101	Brooklyn Rail	2
101	Brooklyn Review	2
101	Carve	2
101	Chautauqua	2
101	Columbia Review	2
101	Confrontation	2
101	Crab Orchard Review	2
101	Faultline	2
101	Fifth Wednesday	2
101	Fourteen Hills	2
101	Gulf Coast	2
101	Hotel Amerika	2
101	Inkwell	2
101	J Journal	2
101	Meridian	2
101	Notre Dame Review	2
101	Paper Street © (?)	2
101	Passages North	2
101	Redivider	2
101	Sarabande Books	2
101	Sou'wester	2
101	The Journal	2
101	Timber Creek Review (?)	2
101	Turnrow	2
134	Amazon Shorts ©	1
134	Antietam Review ©	1
134	Art and Understanding	1
134	Artful Dodge	1
134	Arts & Letters	1
134	Ascent	1
134	At Length	1
134	Ballyhoo Stories	1
134	Baltimore Review	1
134	Blue Earth Review	1
134	Blue Mesa Review	1
134	Bomb	1
134	Brain, Child	1
134	Callaloo	1
134	Canio's Editions (?)	1
134	Carnegie Mellon Univ. Press	1
134	Carpe Articulum	1
134	Chariton Review	1
134	Chattahoochee Review	1
134	Cimarron Review	1
134	Contemporary West	1
134	Copper Nickel	1
134	Cutbank	1
134	Denver Quarterly	1
134	Descant	1
134	Dos Passos Review	1
134	Dossier Journal	1
134	Eggemoggin Reach Review (?)	1
134	Epiphany	1
134	EWU Press ©	1
134	Exile	1
134	Florida Review	1
134	Folio	1
134	Frank	1
134	Freight Stories	1
134	Fugue	1
134	Gray's Sporting Journal	1
134	Green Mountains Review	1
134	Grist	1
134	Hampton Shorts (?)	1
134	Healing Muse	1
134	Hunger Mountain	1
134	Iron Horse Literary Review	1
134	Isotope ©	1
134	Jabberwock Review	1
134	Kelsey Review	1
134	King's English ©	1
134	Kyoto Journal	1
134	Lake Effect	1
134	Laughing Fire Press	1
134	Laurel Review	1
134	Lit	1
134	Literal Latte	1
134	Lynx Eye ©	1
134	Maggid	1
134	Margin (?)	1
134	McSweeney's Books	1
134	Mid-List Press	1
134	Minnesota Review	1
134	Momotombo Press	1
134	Mythium	1
134	Natural Bridge	1
134	Nebraska Review ©	1
134	Nerve.com	1
134	New Ohio Review	1
134	New Renaissance	1
134	Night Train	1
134	Nimrod	1
134	Northern Lights (?)	1
134	Open City	1
134	Orion	1
134	Partisan Review ©	1
134	Pearl	1
134	Per Contra	1
134	Phoebe	1
134	Pindeldyboz ©	1
134	Prism	1
134	Puckerbush Press	1
134	Puerto del Sol	1
134	Quarter After Eight	1
134	Quarterly West	1
134	Quick Fiction	1
134	RBS Gazette (?)	1
134	Relief	1
134	Rivendell ©	1
134	Rosebud	1
134	Salamander	1
134	Seems	1
134	Slice	1
134	Small Town (?)	1
134	Smoke Long Quarterly	1
134	Soft Skull Press	1
134	South Carolina Review	1
134	Southampton Review	1
134	Southern California Review	1
134	Spork	1
134	Stolen Time Press (?)	1
134	Stone Canoe	1
134	Subtropics	1
134	Sycamore Review	1
134	Tampa Review	1
134	Tiferet	1
134	Transformation (?)	1
134	Underground Voices	1
134	Upstreet	1
134	War, Literature and The Arts	1
134	Words of Wisdom (?)	1
134	World Literature Today	1
134	Xconnect (?)	1
134	Press 53	1
134	Electric Literature	1
134	Akashic Books	1
134	Dogwood	1
134	Five Chapters	1