The Time Traveller: a rare-books magazine

Among the projects I worked on this winter was to copyedit a new, independent Irish magazine called The Time Traveller. It comes from the bookstore of the same name, which has three outlets in the west of Ireland: Westport, County Mayo; Skibbereen, County Cork; and Cork city.

The Time Traveller’s bookshop specialises in rare books, and the magazine, a quarterly, does likewise, its topics reaching into art, philosophy, history, publishing, poetry, culture, music, education, and literature in general. As its editor Holger Smyth writes in his editorial:

There is no point in starting a shy publication that looks pretty and is full of words but has nothing to say. Would it be wise to pretend everything is fine when the whole world is on the run? This quarterly will try to shine a light on important and forgotten publications, political ideas that should have been implemented, philosophies that could have made a difference, authors who could have been honoured, voices that should have been heard.

The Time Traveller offers these and more, but it is unquestionably pretty too – as you would expect from rare-book specialists. I’m delighted to be involved in its production, and I also contribute a column to it under the banner ‘Our Living Language’.

The inaugural issue of The Time Traveller can be viewed on the bookshop’s website, where you’ll also find subscription details. There’s a limited-time offer whereby subscribing for two years in advance gets you a full refund in the form of gift vouchers for the bookshops.

Update: Sadly, The Time Traveller magazine is no longer in operation.