Civil Lines (magazine)
Civil Lines was an Indian literary magazine, launched in 1994 by publisher Ravi Dayal. In its years of existence, the "magazine" published only five issues, and none since the death of Dayal in 2006.
Inception
Ravi Dayal, the magazine's publisher, had worked with Oxford University Press between 1971 and 1987, initially as an editor and later as the CEO of OUP's Delhi office. After his retirement in 1987, he opened his own publishing company, Ravi Dayal Publishers, which did fairly well. Encouraged by this relative success, he decided to start a literary magazine in English, and in 1994, he finally started ''Civil Lines.''Periodicity
The magazine sought to challenge the traditional literary model by refusing to publish to a set schedule. Instead, it prioritized quality, with issues appearing only when the editors felt that they had an adequate quantity of intelligent, well-written and inspirational material to justify publication. The result has been five issues to date, all defined by their eclecticism, intelligence and originality.Editorial focus
Inspired by the British magazine Granta, the magazine focused on high quality unpublished fiction, personal history, reportage and inquiring journalism intended to appeal to intellectual, literate Indians living in urban areas.The five issues of Civil lines were edited by Rukun Advani, Ivan Hutnik, Mukul Kesavan and Kai Friese. Civil lines was edited by practising writers rather than academics. It therefore had no defined literary manifesto which determined content. Civil Lines is ultimately a testimony to power of the story to describe and illuminate.