Women's Review to publish anew
The Women's Review of Books ceased publication last December, but now it appears reports of its death were greatly exaggerated.
With a new partner shouldering costs and business management, the journal of arts, politics, and commentary will return in January with the same content, same editor, and same sponsorship by Wellesley College. Besides a visual redesign, the only change is that the monthly will become a bimonthly.
''I'm thrilled, just incredibly pleased," said editor Amy Hoffman, who will resume running the tabloid-size review at the Wellesley Centers for Women, where it was born in 1983. ''We're a place where people can have thoughtful, substantial discussions on feminist thinking and research," Hoffman said. ''We've provided a place for scholars and activists to talk to readers and promote dialogue."
Susan Bailey, executive director of the Wellesley Centers, called the Women's Review ''one of the last publications of its sort. . . . It's particularly important that there be a place for reviews and feminist writing and perspective."
Wellesley's new 50/50 partner is Philadelphia-based Old City Publishing, a for-profit niche operator focused primarily on scientific journals. Old City will handle the review's business operations and pay a royalty to the Wellesley Centers to cover Hoffman's salary.
The Women's Review had steadily lost subscriptions over the years, and Wellesley could no longer absorb increases in the review's debt, which had reached $200,000. Its last issue was December 2004. Hoffman, not wanting to see the magazine die, said she and the Wellesley Centers had sought partners but could find none that could accept the costs. Then she heard from Old City.
Founded by Ian Mellanby, Old City publishes such obscure journals as Inorganic Reaction Mechanisms and the Journal of Multiple-Valued Logic and Soft Computing, as well as trade books on mountaineering, biography, and fiction. In a telephone interview, Mellanby said he had learned about the Women's Review's problems from Rutgers University Press, which was disappointed at the prospect of losing a key outlet for advertising its women's studies program.
''We moved quickly when we heard it was to be suspended," said Mellanby. He says the review's costs will be much lower when subscriptions, billing, and advertising are managed though Old City's centralized system for all its magazines rather than by the review. Under the agreement, the Wellesley Centers have agreed to absorb the existing debt, with hopes of whittling it down through the new system.
Mellanby says he is convinced that the Women's Review can regain its subscription list (12,000 at its peak, 5,500 toward the end of last year). He also says the review's traditional advertising base -- university presses and smaller publishers with book lists of special interest to women -- is still out there, still eager to support it.
''I have no doubt that it can be profitable," Mellanby said. ''It has a good editor, a good product, and a good reputation. We would like not just to rebuild it but perhaps have an international perspective . . . and take it to another level."
David Mehegan can be reached at mehegan@globe.com. 
