''The Toast'' was an American anthology, humor and feminist writing website, founded by editors

Nicole Cliffe Nicole Cliffe (born September 2, 1982) is a Canadian writer living in Utah, who co-founded and co-edited the website ''The Toast'' with Daniel Lavery. Early life Nicole Cliffe was born September 2, 1982 and grew up in Kingston, Ontario. A fir ...

and Daniel M. Lavery (né Ortberg) and publisher Nicholas Pavich. It was active from January 2013 through July 2016.

Content and target audience

The website was known for its parodic reworkings of classic literature and art. Lavery has described its target market as 'librarians'. ''The Toast'' has also published on

feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

LGBTQIA+ ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is an ...

experiences, and ethnicity-related topics, including a lengthy series on adoption. At the site's debut, Cliffe and Lavery described its "stance," noting that "We strive to be intersectionally feminist. We are pro-choice. We are pro-queer. We are pro-trans. We strive to feature writing from women of all ethnic backgrounds Its name originates from the

toast Toast most commonly refers to: * Toast (food), bread browned with dry heat * Toast (honor), a ritual in which a drink is taken Toast may also refer to: Places * Toast, North Carolina, a census-designated place in the United States Books * '' ...

of the British

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

hoping for " a willing foe, and sea room", which was used as its slogan. Lavery and Cliffe previously both wrote for ''

The Hairpin ''The Hairpin'' was a women's website in The Awl network. It was founded in 2010 by Edith Zimmerman. It ceased publication at the end of January 2018. From 2013 to 2014, ''The Hairpin'' was edited by Emma Carmichael, with Jia Tolentino as contri ...

,'' through which they met. Lavery's books, ''Texts from Jane Eyre'' and ''The Merry Spinster'', are developments of his writing on ''The Toast''. From October 15, 2014, to September 2015, the project also included a vertical called The Butter; led by

Roxane Gay Roxane Gay (born October 15, 1974) is an American writer, professor, editor, and social commentator. Gay is the author of ''The New York Times'' best-selling essay collection '' Bad Feminist'' (2014), as well as the short story collection ''Ayit ...

, The Butter focused on personal essays and cultural criticism.

Closure

Co-founder Nicholas Pavich, who was credited as publisher, left the site in summer 2015. Lavery and Cliffe announced 13 May 2016 that they were "closing" the site as of 1 July 2016. They cited declining advertising revenues and the difficulties of managing the website alongside their writing careers. Lavery had previously commented that sustaining the rate of material needed to earn advertising revenue was difficult: "I generally write anywhere from 2-4 posts a day, and they're very rarely blog posts, it's almost all original fiction or humor or essays and a lot of our site's traffic is dependent on that. Luckily, I enjoy it, but it can also be creatively demanding, and if we have a slow day, it's kind of my fault and if I half-ass it, we look stupid and boring." ''The Toast'' website remained online after the closure, with infrequent updates, through 28 Jan 2018. The last published article was a publication announcement for ''Hey Ladies'', a book inspired by a regular feature on the site. The final contribution to the website before it ceased regular publication was a column by

Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...

, in which she reflected on the blog's importance to female writers.

Archiving by the Library of Congress

In January 2018, The Toast was selected by

the Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

for inclusion in its web archives. The completed archive consists of captures from September 19, 2013, to November 11, 2016.

Notable contributors

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Toast (website), The 2013 establishments in the United States American women's websites Internet properties established in 2013 Internet properties disestablished in 2016 Mass media companies established in 2013 Feminist blogs American satirical websites