Bellevue Literary Review Celebrates 25 Years of Humanizing Healthcare through Storytelling

The award-winning literary journal devoted to health, illness, and healing marks a quarter century of creativity and community

NEW YORK, NY, UNITED STATES, February 5, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Bellevue Literary Review (BLR), an award-winning and nationally recognized literary journal devoted to health, illness, and healing, celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, marking a quarter century of publishing fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction that illuminate the human experience of medicine.

The first literary journal to arise from a medical setting, BLR emerged from a simple but radical idea: that stories are essential to understanding illness, caring for patients, and sustaining those who work within healthcare. Over the past 25 years, BLR has become a vital forum for writers, clinicians, patients, and caregivers, publishing work that explores vulnerability, mortality, resilience, and the complex emotional terrain of being human in the face of illness.

This spring, BLR will publish its 50th issue. To date, BLR has published more than 1,500 authors, both emerging voices and well-known writers such as Celeste Ng, Abraham Verghese, and Leslie Jamison. BLR reaches over 10,000 readers by journal subscription and twice-weekly newsletter, and connects with an even larger national and international audience through its website, social media, and wide range of online and in-person events.

At a time when healthcare is increasingly shaped by speed, technology, and metrics, BLR has remained committed to the human dimension. Creative expression is a vital tool for navigating the fear, grief, and uncertainty that medicine alone cannot address.

“Medicine treats disease, but storytelling tends to the person,” said Danielle Ofri, BLR’s editor-in-chief and also a practicing physician. “For 25 years, BLR has been a space where illness is not reduced to diagnosis, and healing is understood as something that creativity can help us grapple with.”

In addition to its biannual print journal, BLR supports a vibrant community through readings, events, writing workshops, newsletters, literary prizes, and educational programming. These initiatives reflect BLR’s broader mission: to humanize healthcare by centering voices that are often unheard and experiences that resist simplification.

BLR’s 25th anniversary will be celebrated with an ambitious series of events including an Art in Medicine program for medical trainees, a workshop focused on "Writing Illness onto the Page,” and "Conversations on Creative Writing in Healthcare,” an online series featuring bestselling authors Meghan O’Rourke, Susannah Cahalan, Porochista Khakpour, Rebekah Taussig, Sarah LaBrie, and Damon Tweedy. In-person events include a live reading at City Winery in New York City and a book salon with Edward Hirsch, president of the Guggenheim Foundation.

In an era of burnout, fragmentation, and widening inequities in healthcare, BLR’s work underscores the enduring power of narrative to foster empathy, ethical reflection, and shared humanity.

“Connection feels increasingly rare,” said Ofri. “BLR reminds us that stories—told honestly and artfully—can still bring us together.”

For more information about Bellevue Literary Review, its anniversary events, or subscription details, visit the BLR website.

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PRAISE FOR BELLEVUE LITERARY REVIEW

“No human thing is more universal than illness, in all its permutations, and no literary publication holds more credibility on the subject than Bellevue Literary Review.” – NewPages.com

"Bellevue Literary Review probes our understanding of the human body and mind in new ways. It is essential reading for anyone who deals with sickness and health, anyone interested in narrative medicine, anyone who simply needs a dose of deep grace and humanity.” – The Oliver Sacks Foundation

"The editors have produced a journal of uncommon literary quality.”
– JAMA

“Ask any healthcare worker, ask any patient who has come back from illness and fear, and you will hear stories that might change your life. That's what BLR offers.”
– Cortney Davis, nurse and poet

“BLR's contents are at once practically instructive, and yet intangibly inspiring and utterly gripping. I can’t imagine my work as a writer, or a doctor, without it.”
– Rafael Campo, physician and poet

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Stacy Bodziak
Bellevue Literary Review
+1 929-925-5401
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