You’ve seen so many by now: People asking for money to launch a new comic book, an indie press, a literary magazine, even this thing—but this doesn’t seem to be your average Kickstarter campaign. Boston Review isn’t looking for a handout, but rather to provide an interested readership with “content available as widely as possible” and “to improve the tone of public debate.” To offer more great writing like this, this, and this. To finish the promising improvements they began back in 2010.

And so rather than reaching wildly out to the masses soliciting funds as so many have done, BR took a step back and checked in with their base to see what’s what. They asked the poets. Here’s BR Marketing Director Daniel Pritchard:

Last week, we reached out to the BR poetry community with an appeal to commit the crucial first burst of funds, the kind of initial influx that encourages new donors to contribute. The response was far more enthusiastic than we had even hoped…. The core Boston Review poetry community alone has committed almost a quarter of our total goal.

In the middle of so many “poetry / books / reading / literature is dying” stories, this seems to me like a statement, not only about the vitality of poetry culture, but of the importance of Boston Review right now to poetry.

On that note, pop over to their campaign. Grab a messenger bag or lunch with editor Deborah Chasman.