How The Watermark Changed

In order to understand the publication history of The Watermark we should look at the kind of journal it became over the long years of publication. To do this, I would like to focus on several Volumes in specific carefully selected from various points of its existence. Volumes 11.5, 23, and 34 are particularly worthy of discussion not just as artifacts of UMass Boston publication history, but because of what these issues are doing as physical pieces of media. As a result, this chapter is split into several sub-essays that detail the publication history. 

These issues were selected for what they did as books as issues of The Watermark at various points in its publication history and serve to illustrate how it changed materially, editorially, and institutionally, and are worth looking at in isolation to build out a deeper understanding of the journal. 

 Volume XI.V (2004)

I would like to tentatively posit that the early 2000s to mid 2000s represent a Golden Age of The Watermark. When looking at physical copies of Issue #9 (2003) to Issue #18 (2009) there is a remarkable level of consistency in journal aesthetic, journal thickness / page number, and physical aesthetic as a 6x9-ish product. Earlier issues, such as from the 90s are physically larger sized books. Later copies from the late teens and early 2020s are both physically larger books and thinner overall. When put together in a row, the run from Issue #9 to Issue #18 looks like one continuous series. Issues that fall outside of it are just physically different and mostly slimmer on content. Issue 11.5 was chosen because it represents an era of publication stability (materially) and institutional peakedness.  

Let us take a detailed look at the Editor’s introduction, which carries with it a kind of triumphalism in tone from the Fall Semester of 2004 . Note that typos are preserved from the original manuscript:

They said it couldn't be done. They said that we were mad. But we forged ahead anyway... This is the first year that we've had a fall issue of The Watermark, and we would like to thank all the students, faculty, and staff who had a hand in this achievement. If it wasn't for them, there wouldn't be a journal. We truly appreciate all your support, especially the tireless work of our editors and their staffs. There are certain collaborators who have been exceptionally patient with us, and we would like to name names: Nancy Stieber and Liz Marran in the Art Department for their help in establishing an outside jury for the art award; Askold Melnyczuk for his support and advice throughout; Neal Bruss in the English Department for his inspired editing; Caroline Cosica and the Graduate Student Assembly; Tristan Lowe, Adnan Usman and the Undergraduate Student Senate; DonnaNeal for her compassion and guidance; Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Charlie Titus and Chancellor Keith Motley for their encouragement; Samantha Pitchel and Paulina Kozak for their indespensible effort; everyone who submitted; and Nancy Derby and Diane Costagliola for leaving us (not totally alone) with their legacy. So after weeks of promotions, juries, and general production the first-ever fall issue of The Watermark is out, hot off the press and cooling in your hands. We hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed putting it together. And stay tuned for the spring issue, coming out in May 2005.

Dereck S. Mangus & Erica Mena

December 2004

Clearly, The Watermark in this period was not afraid to speak with an earned confidence about itself. In fact, Issue XI.V ends with several pages of a manifesto-like document outlining the then literary landscape of Boston, Massachusetts. The Watermark here shifted from purely producing a UMass Boston literary artifact, to mapping the artistic landscape and UMass Boston’s role within it. It was a period of maximum institutional confidence and editorial coherence across a line of editors, and later research would confirm that 6,000 copies of The Watermark were printed annually at the time when Dereck and Erica were running it. 

Volume #XXIII (2014)

If Volume XI.V was a part of a Golden Age, Volume 23 from 2014 represents The Watermark at its apogee. The size and shape of a textbook with a density to match, Issue 23 describes itself as a ‘chronicle of UMass Boston Student Art and Literature, 1969-2014’. It sits at 352 pages and exists not just as a journal, but a catalog of the previous years of The Watermark, Howth Castle, and the original UMass Boston progenitor magazine, Wavelengths. Much of UMass Boston’s digital holdings were created in coordination of Volume 23, as is explained in its editorial note;

In the spirit of Umass Boston’s 50th anniversary we perused back issues of campus literary journals to find our origin.

The book presents itself as a ‘best of’ publication, and features full-color images of prior cover arts and, in the absence of any other existing copies of The Watermark, could function as a kind of Rosetta Stone for UMass Boston. Archival staff were closely coordinated with, and special gratitude given to one Jessica Holden, an Associate University Archivist for Research Services at UMass, for assistance provided while searching through records and archived copies of Howth Castle and Wavelengths, which were mined for contributions. 

Another noteworthy element to Volume #23 was distribution. This must, it must be stressed, be taken with a grain of salt. But when one looks at the physical number of copies of The Watermark found within the English Department graduate lounge (where all the bulk copies I could find were located.) the overwhelming majority of copies were of Volume #23. Part of this might have something to do with the fact that, given the density of Issue #23, several copies were being used to prop up a small bookshelf holding former student’s Thesis Projects. The size of the book means it was not as easily transportable as the slimmer 6x9 volumes, and as a result more of them seem to have been left around the room. 

There does, it must be confessed, seem to be at this point a break in coordination with the archive. If Volume #23 was born of collaboration with the archive (as the editors introduction seems to suggest) then it also marked the end point of collaboration and coordination with the on-campus archive. After Volume #22, there are no further digitized issues available for public download, and this is the point in the narrative when our reconstruction of The Watermark becomes more speculative.

Volume #34 (2022)

As a book, Issue #34 is fascinating. If you’ll allow a brief tangent, numismatists track the development (or devolution) of classical civilizations by the metal content of their coins. Gold and silver coins are, naturally, indicative of a healthy and stable society. Bronze coins coated in the thinnest layer of silver are naturally made by unhealthy societies. Taking this idea and applying it to print culture, UMass Boston’s print culture at this point had become decidedly unhealthy for the sustainability of a print journal. COVID must be mentioned and acknowledged as a potential contributing factor. But it is interesting that it is one of two saddle stitched volumes in Watermark history, with the other making explicit mention in its editor’s note about funding cuts. Correlation does not imply causation, but it must still be noted. This fact also earmarks it for discussion, however I have been unable to get into contact with anyone who directly worked on it to find out why. In the absence of testimony from anyone directly involved in the production of Volume #34, the reason for this change remains uncertain. Budgetary pressures are one possible explanation, based on evidence from the editors’ notes and changes in page counts.

I suspect it was budgetary, based on data provided in on editor’s notes and page counts. But it could have been aesthetic, given that by this point in Watermark history issue shapes, sizes, and densities had wild variations on an almost issue-to-issue level by this point. 

It has already been briefly mentioned, but by Volume #34 copies of The Watermark were just physically different books. Part of this can be traced out by contributor counts. In 2001, Volume #9 had 53 individual contributors across a number of genres and mediums. In Issue #15 from 2006, there were 33 individual contributors. Volume #34 had 14 contributors. 

The editors note for Volume #2 of The Watermark states that, quote, “We receive approximately seven hundred submissions annually and reducing that number to a journal of just over one hundred pages is an enormous task.”

The editors note for Volume #3 of the Watermark states that, quote, “.. I watched the poetry editors at work: each editor received a xerox of each of about 250 poems (with only a student number for identification)...”

The book is smaller, staplebound instead of perfect bound (as has been mentioned already.) and while the production quality is undeniably as good as the issues that came before, it feels physically almost like a different book entirely. We must understand that this is something that happens in student publications. Uniformity is the exception, not the rule. For example, immediately after Volume #23 had been published, Issue #24 maintained the textbook-esq shape and size at about 1/4th the thickness. The Volumes from the 1990s and early 2000s were around ‘Digest’ sizes. Our volume was almost ‘pocket’ sized. 

Again, this could be the result of budgetary stress and attempted adaptation, a one-off event (now having happened twice) during financial precarity in its later history. But it does not explain why the next two issues, the second-to-last and the last, switched back to perfect binding. Distribution during all of this, however, remained the same. I can vividly and distinctly recall seeing a stack of copies in or around 2022-2023 while I was finishing my Undergrad degree on the 6th Floor of Wheatley hall, in a stand usually reserved for copies of the Mass Media, UMass Boston’s own independent student-run newspaper, that shared a distribution network with the Watermark out of kindness. I remember the fascination I had for the book when I took a copy, and I remember doing no followup research on the state of the publication. I just took it, enjoyed it, and moved on with my life without considering that small journals are really dependent on students translating that passing curiosity into active investigation.