Sending Us Your Work

☞ We are glad you’re interested in contributing to The Bombay Literary Magazine. We publish three times a year: April, August and December. Our most recent issue is Issue 62 (December 2025). Our next issue (#63) will be published on April 15, 2026.

☞ We are now open for submissions in translated fiction, translated poetry, graphic fiction and essays. The deadline for submissions is January 31, 2026 (midnight, Indian Standard Time). Please submit your work via the provided form. We do not evaluate works sent to us by email.

☞ We are closed for submissions in (untranslated) fiction and poetry. Sorry!

☞ We only consider unpublished work. Personal blogs, social media posts, college magazines, newspapers, graffiti, milk carton copy, etc. all count as prior publications.

☞ We offer an honorarium of INR 5,000 (five-thousand Indian rupees, approximately $60 USD) per published contribution.

☞ Alert (Jan 8): A few people have reported upload issues with the submission system. It’s usually browser-related and we recommend re-trying with a different browser.

☞ We have a cap of 400 submissions in each category. Please don’t send us more than one work for consideration. That is, no multiple submissions. For example, don’t send us a fiction piece and a set of poems or a graphic fiction piece and a translation. The other submission requirements are category-specific:

☞ Short Fiction: [Now closed for submissions] Your short story should be between 2,000 and 5,000 words in length. TBLM doesn’t publish flash fiction, fan fiction, plays, novellas or novels. Stories don’t have to be anonymised. We welcome all kinds of short fiction, but please note the word-count limits do matter.

☞ Poetry: [Now closed for submissions] Please send us one document with five poems in English. Why five? We are publishing a poet, not just poems, so we like to get a sense of how they approach the art.

☞ Translations: We welcome translated poetry (3-5 poems) and translated short fiction (2,000-5,000 words)in English. Each is considered a separate category. Please include a full citation for the original source. If you like, you may also include a translator’s note (here’s a good example of one). If accepted for publication, we will need to verify you have the translation rights the text (see FAQs).

☞ Self-Translations: [Now closed for submissions] We treat self-translated works as original works in English. In other words, please submit self-translations as original poetry or original fiction contributions.

☞ Essays: We are looking for essays/creative non-fiction between 2,000 and 5,000 words. We love essays that move, delight, surprise, make us laugh, or reveal new and intelligent ways of looking at the world. Currently however, we are not looking for academic writing or book reviews. We want essays that leap from catharsis to craft— whether personal or not, they should show us what’s at stake for both reader and writer. We welcome experimental writing. As Brian Dillon points out, the “essay” has always been an assay, a testing ground.

☞ Visual Narratives: Currently, these are sourced on an invitation-only basis.

☞ Graphic Fiction: We are looking for adult-oriented graphic fiction. Radical is good. Genre-crossing is good plus. Edgy, retro-edgy, antidisestablishmentarian, missionary position: itsallgood, maacha! Whack us out. The length of the piece is up to you. In the past, we have published 40+ page works as well as 3-6 pagers.

☞ Submission Options: Multiple submissions won’t be evaluated. You may send the submitted work to other magazines (i.e. simultaneous submissions are okay). However, please inform us (help@bombaylitmag.com) if your work is selected elsewhere. We remember such acts of courtesy. One more thing: if more than 2 of your poems are accepted elsewhere, we will not have enough material to consider your submission, and it will therefore be marked withdrawn.

FAQs

1. Why is there a cap on the number of submissions?

   ☞ We get a lot of submissions. The evaluation process consists of at least four rounds of evaluation and our editors have to respond within six weeks. A cap on the number of submissions ensures our sanity and your equity.

2. How do I submit something that isn’t easily classified? For example, a graphic poem narrative or speculative nonfiction?

   ☞ Agreed. Sometimes creative work just does not fit into neat little tiffin boxes. If so, simply select a genre that feels closest, and we’ll sort it out, post-acceptance. But one caveat: if we get a submission that we would classify as fiction, say, but the cap for fiction had been reached before you had submitted, then the submission won’t be evaluated. Likewise for other categories. Unfortunately, we have to be hard-ass about this, because more than a few authors try to bypass the cutoff limits.

3. Do you accept interviews and reviews?

   ☞ Currently, no.

4. Do you accept submissions in languages other than English?

   ☞ Alas, we do not. TBLM is an English-language based literary magazine. However, we welcome English-language translations from other languages.

5. You’ve published me before. When should I next send you my work?

   ☞ Hello, friend! We recommend you wait for one issue before sending us something in the same genre. And do let us know you’re a TBLM alum while submitting.

6. What IP rights do you ask for?

   ☞ We only ask for the minimum set of digital rights that will let us legally display your work online, exclusively for a period of one year, but non-exclusively thereafter. You retain all other rights. Translation rights follow the same pattern, but it can get complicated, since in most legal jurisdictions it is the original author and not the translator who is ultimately assigning the rights. If the work isn’t in the public domain and there aren’t any other extenuating circumstances, we need some document— letter, photo of letter, contract copy— indicating you, the translator, has the legal right to translate the original work.

7. Tell me more about the honorarium.

   ☞ The amount of Rs. 5,000 (approx. $62) is for the accepted work. If there are multiple authors involved, they may share the amount as desired. If the work is a translation, then the honorarium of Rs. 5,000 is transferred to the translator(s), not the original author.

8. I am a writer under eighteen years of age. May I send my work to TBLM?

   ☞ Afraid not. If you are not an adult, then parents need to get involved, and we generally do our best to avoid parental supervision. But relax, grasshopper. We’ll be around. Send us something once you’re old enough for the nation-state to ship you off to wars.

9. I don’t wish to reveal my current legal name. Can I submit under a pseudonym?

   ☞ Sure, the work can be submitted & published under a pseudonym. But the publication contract requires your current legal name.

10. Help! I am not sure my submission went through. I’m afraid I may have submitted twice. I may have picked the wrong category. I attached the wrong manuscript. And misspelled my name. Or was it my email address? How high is up?Help!

    ☞ No worries, querant. For these and other existential queries, just ping us at help@bombaylitmag.com. We usually respond within a day.