New Magazine Makes Debut Today

"Cellar Door," a student magazine featuring "a mischievous miscellany" of fiction, essays, satire and poetry, will hit the news stands for the first time today.

The pieces in the inaugural issue range from computer-enhanced graphics to an art review of a Neo-Dada exhibit to a parody of Cliff Notes.

The purpose of the magazine is to give all students a chance to express their artistic talents, according to founders Karin S. Lewicki '96, Quentin A. Palfrey '96 and Ali Zarrinpar '96.

"What we want to do is to provide an open forum for the juxtaposition of all media," Lewicki said. "Here on campus we are taught to analyze a certain way. We want to provide a place for people who want to go outside that."

According to Zarrinpar, another purpose of the magazine is to fill the void left by other, more political magazines.

"We are not politically-oriented, we have no agenda," Zarrinpar said. "We would like to give Harvard students, who happen to be incredibly creative people, a chance to display their talents."

Magazine members said they do not think "Cellar Door" will overlap with "The Advocate," Harvard's century-old creative magazine.

Palfrey said that "Cellar Door" differs from "The Advocate" in that the former is much less hierarchical and institutional.

"I think that they are two totally different concepts that fill very different roles," Palfrey said. "We haven't been here for a hundred years; we don't have a set base of people.

Palfrey described "The Advocate" as intimidating, particularly for first-years. "We want all people who consider themselves artists or creators," he said.

The magazine plans to publish once more this year and hopes eventually to become a quarterly, according to Palfrey.

The first issue of "Cellar Door" was funded by grants from the Harvard Foundation, the Harvard Office for the Arts and the Undergraduate Council. Founders said they will try to fund the magazine through advertisements in the future.

Zarrinpar did not disclose the reasons for naming the magazine "Cellar Door."

But he did say that Edgar Allen Poe is rumored to have said that "cellar door is the most beautiful phrase in the English language."