Louisville Review Corporation

All Gifts up to $7,500 DOUBLED with our Board of Directors Match!

Independent Publishing Based in Louisville, KY

Celebrating 50 Years of Print Publication in Fall 2026!

Twice a year, The Louisville Review Corporation publishes the work of debut writers alongside that of established writers in our nationally distributed print literary journal founded in 1976, The Louisville Review. Our Fleur-de-Lis Press publishes first books by writers published in The Louisville Review and winners of our contests, because we understand the impact a first book publication makes in the life of a writer. Today, we're asking for your support, so that we can continue our progress and success in supporting the development of emerging writers.

What We Do:

Recent successes: In our fall 2025 - spring 2026 publication cycle we published two issues, fall and spring, of The Louisville Review, that included work by nationally known authors such as Angela Jackson-Brown, Kristi Maxwell, and Kiki Petrosino, as well as emerging writers from Kentucky such as Kathy Nicarry, Brandon North, and Eva Kramer, as well as over 150 contributors from Kentucky and across the US, and in translation from around the world. 

We published a book of poems by the winner of our National Poetry Book Contest, When We Were Gun, by Deborah Schupack, that confronts the tragic realities if school shootings. We ran a new contest, The Frederick Smock Poetry Prize, a first-book contest specifically for Kentucky affiliated writers, judged by  Kentucky Poet Laureate Emeritus Richard Taylor, who selected Ellen Elder’s We Left a Window Open to the Sea, available this November form Fleur-de-Lis Press, thanks to support from the Snowy Owl Foundation. 

This fall we're launching the Fleur-de-Lis Novella Prize, and announcing a new chapbook series for writers under age 23 who have been previously published in our Cornerstone poetry section for writers in grades K-12.

Our forthcoming 50th Anniversary Issue also celebrates the 35th anniversary of the longest running predominantly African American poetry group, the Affrilachian Poets Collective, edited by Kentucky Poet Laureate Emeritus Frank X Walker. Thanks to Fund for the Arts, we’re able to partner with Walker and the Frazier Kentucky History Museum for a reading with the Affrilachian Poets November 6, 2026, that’s free and open to the public.

We're engaging the local community with our adoption of the Annette Allen Poetry Prize, free to enter specifically for Louisville area university students, who receive publication in TLR, cash prizes, and are invited to readings at The Louisville Conference at Literature and Culture and the Kentucky Women's Book Festival at the Louisville Book Festival.

What Your Donation Supports:

Your donation helps ensure continuing production of our flagship journal, The Louisville Review, published twice a year, and supports Fleur-de-Lis Press that publishes two titles a year by writers previously published in The Louisville Review and winners of our contests.

In addition to staff salaries and general operating expenses, recent production costs for our fall 2025 - spring 2026 publication cycle include: Guest Editor and Judge honorariums for reading submissions from over 1,000 writers per year—without ever charging a reading fee for submissions to The Louisville Review! Typesetting and design for the production of issues and books. Artist honorariums for cover artwork by living artists. Printing and mailing for over 1,000 copies of The Louisville Review and over 300 copies of our newest poetry book. 

Over the years we’ve been able to publish several now well-known writers, including Kentucky Poet Laureates, early in their careers. Your support helps us promote and support the next generation of great writers!

Thank you for supporting the literary arts and independent publishing!

Sena Jeter Naslund, Founding Editor, author of Ahab's Wife

Flora K. Schildknecht, Editor and Executive Director