There is a new literary presence lurking about the University Tennessee, beckoning passersby and enchanting them with tales from the minds of students, staff members and alumni. Thankfully, this Siren won't lead you to shipwreck.

The idea for the Siren was conceived from junior Mary Marley and her friend Mahasin Habeel while they were discussing the need for a new, different literary magazine. They talked with other friends about the idea and suddenly they had a staff:

• Mary Marley, Editor in Chief

• Mahasin Habeel, assistant editor

• Austin Duck, poetry editor

• Mathew Kendall, fiction editor

• Andrew Kay and Mathew Lawson, criticism/assistant fiction editor 

These six UT students embarked on a quest to provide the Knoxville community with an alternative medium for the literary voices of the area and The Siren was born.

"We like to think we are representing a different perspective," said Marley. "We would like to see a magazine that has more literature in its content as opposed to say visual imagery."

Staff members are also hoping The Siren will call attention to the "literary crisis" here on the UT campus.

"We really haven't had a strong literary community represented here, even though we have some really amazing writers who have come from this area, which is why the vacancy was so disturbing to begin with." -Mary Marley

The Siren accepts submissions from UT students, alumni and staff members in the areas of poetry, fiction, non-fiction and the often neglected art of literary criticism.

"We feel like there's this unnecessary division between criticism and creative writing," said Marley, "like the creative writers hate and loath the critics because they are afraid they will be criticized and the critics are sort of jealous and resentful of the creative writers."

In any case, The Siren is traveling down a path few have dared to venture. Marley and her staff planned, created and distributed their magazine entirely by themselves.

"Oh, it was so complicated," said Marley. "Basically we had two main concerns. We had the concern of money so we could put it out and the issue of content."

The Siren staff created advertising packets for local businesses in hopes of selling ad space to fund their publication

"A lot of times they weren't interested right away and we had to leave it with them and come back several times before they would sign the contract," said Marley. "So that was just a matter of being a bit pushy."

Content was a different story. They couldn't pinpoint who their submitters would be. Marley and her staff put up fliers advertising The Siren, made announcements in classes, talked to professors and contacted the English department's newsletter.  In the end they received over 100 submissions and weeded through them to find the perfect number that would embody what they felt was good literature.

"We wanted material that was wonderful, that was beautiful to read and good to read. Do we feel its strong enough to print? That's always the final question."  -Mary Marley

Since the Siren staff is interconnected with the UT literary community, they had to be wary of who they were actually choosing to be published in the magazine.

"There's this really delicate balance between just using your assets, your friends who are writers, your professors who are writers, things like that and actually just being a magazine about you and your friends, which is not what we want to do," said Marley. "We want to be there for the community. This is a gift we are giving, It's not just for ourselves."