Green Light means go

Troubador, Nassau Weekly, The Tory — move over — a new student publication has hit campus: Green Light Magazine. The first edition of the literary magazine, titled "People, Politics, Prose, Princeton" arrived Wednesday and is available at every dining hall and at various other outlets on campus.

"We want to make sure everyone gets a copy," founder Andrew Perlmutter '06 said. The 10,000 full-color, high-gloss copies are tempting in their visual appeal, and the publication boasts a broad collection of articles and creative writing pieces.

Last year Perlmutter noticed the lack of "really excellent, witty literary publications on campus" and decided to take matters into his own hands. His vision was to bring together a variety of articles ranging from political writings, to interviews to fiction. It would all be written by the entire Princeton community — students, faculty and alumni.

"The mission is to bring people together, to have a dialogue for all of Princeton," Perlmutter said.

Perlmutter plans to publish Green Light twice a semester, which would make it one of the few quarterly magazines at Princeton. He said that Troubadour, another literary magazine on campus that comes out twice a year, has a tendency to go unnoticed because of it irregular schedule. He hopes regular issues in October, December, February and April will encourage readers to remember and expect the magazine throughout the year.

The broad coverage of Green Light's articles also makes the publication unique on campus. Most Princeton magazines focus on news, politics or student creative writing, while excluding other fields. This new magazine hopes to cover current events on and off campus and include creative writing submissions.

Many students seem to support the addition of Green Light and the general expansion of literary outlets.

"The quality of publications here are superb," Lindsey Huddle '07 said. "But there are only so many people who want to write and who write well, so there will be a limit to how many Princeton can take; whether we've hit critical capacity or not, I don't know." There will always be readers for a new quality publication, she said.

Though Perlmutter was always confident that there was a niche for this kind of magazine, he struggled with fundraising at the beginning. Since Perlmutter could not ask the USG Project Board for money in order to be recognized as a student organization, Perlmutter needed to turn to the various academic departments, including the Council of the Humanities, and to alumni to cover the $13,000 publication tab.

Alumni and faculty, however, can have a much greater role in the publication; they are also welcomed as writers. Through Tigernet and various contacts, Perlmutter and his staff, now made up of 45 undergraduate and graduate students, convinced The Rule of Four's author, Ian Caldwell '94, to grant an interview. The first issue will also feature a dialogue between religion department heavyweight Cornel West and politics department star Robert George, student creative writing pieces and a collection of poems and artwork from faculty members.

Perlmutter found inspiration for his magazine in a variety of national publications, such as Elle, Interview Magazine, and especially Vanity Fair and The New Yorker.

"The New Yorker is really a cultural commentary for New York City. It combines editorials about what is going on in the city and longer feature articles and fiction," Perlmutter said, describing these as the key features he is trying to bring to Princeton. Vanity Fair has also influenced the magazine's layout of articles and the general presentation.

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"It's really become Green Light though. It's not a copy of anything. It's something that's really ours," Perlmutter said.

The title of the publication is a reference to the green light at the end of Daisy Buchanan's dock in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby." The luminous spot in the fog encourages Gatsby, who lives across the bay from his love, Daisy, to believe in the doomed love.

Perlmutter said, "this green light is a symbol of Gatsby's idealism and faith in the future. I decided to use the name because I want to show that we have this idealism. And, of course, it helps that Fitzgerald went to Princeton."

The Green Light staff will also be distributing the magazine from a booth in Frist, right outside the pool room, all day today.