Forum / Buy you a drink?

MaryAnne Kolton
Jul 09, 03:37pm

Just thought this little nugget of wonderment worth sharing. Was emailing back and forth with Liz and Laura from Toucan about some changes I had made in the poem "Sex
With Strangers" At one point, I said that I planned on being in Chicago in October and I'd love to buy them a drink. They emailed
back and said, "Great, we'll both be legal by then". . . .please someone tell me they were kidding! Is the fate of our work truly being decided by teenagers???

Andrew Stancek
Jul 09, 04:23pm

Yes,

it is. LOL.

Most of the decision-makers I am coming across are the age of my daughter. Scary but I have had to accept it. Don't have a choice, do I? Should have started this career thirty years ago. I have been joking with my students that I have finally discovered what I want to be when I grow up and some of them even chuckled politely.

James Lloyd Davis
Jul 09, 05:53pm

Where do these children come from?

No, you don't have to answer that ... took biology, so I know where they come from, but why's there so many and who the hell put them in charge?

Susan Tepper
Jul 09, 05:59pm

There are still tons of seasoned editors working at the mags, as well as younger people. I don't see it makes much difference, I've had stuff accepted by very young editors and turned down by the "oldies" and vice versa. I think the young editors are pretty skilled in picking. At least that's been my experience. And they did pick MAR's work-- so there you go...
It's a crap shoot. I'm an editor and I pick what I like. Period. If I hate a certain subject matter, I steer clear of that story. No matter how well it's written. In the end I think it all boils down to personal taste, the same way we go to the bookstore and choose what to buy.

Sam Rasnake
Jul 09, 09:07pm

Rimbaud finished all his great work by age 19. I'd let him edit me any time.

Joani Reese
Jul 09, 11:25pm

Dylan Thomas wrote "and death shall have no dominion" around age 19. I'd love to send that boy some of my stuff and ask him to comment and make suggestions. You never know who these youngsters are studying to become...

MaryAnne Kolton
Jul 10, 04:36am

Okay, You all are right and as Susan said they did choose my work so what am I complaining about? This is me smiling. . . .

Susan Tepper
Jul 10, 05:13am

I hear you smiling. Gee, do you have to smile so noisey? It's late here! ha ha! Have a great night!

Matt Potter
Jul 10, 06:56am

I am new to editing, in a way, but think I was born to do it! Ha ha! (The only compliment I ever received from a former university film-and-TV lecturer of mine, who was a bastard, was that my editing of a 60's TV script had enhanced the meaning. I was 22 at the time, and am 45 now.)

I choose stories I like a lot and also some I just like, but edit many of them, usually for clarity, and sometimes to get some of the pretense out of them. I recognise readers' tastes are different, so I try and reflect some diversity in my choices. But I have a high acceptance rate at Pure Slush, because I actually edit submissions, and give constructive reasons why when I say no. (And yes, I have a full-time job and a family life too.) Too many of these 'editors' are not editors at all but just 'collectors' of stories. This infuriates me, especially as so few 'editors' give feedback.

I started 2011 with a rejection, from an 'editor' who said I had a "needy need" because I asked for some reason behind the rejection. She was exceptionally rude, and quite young with it too. "That is what writing groups are for," she emailed. "Fuck you," I almost emailed back, but didn't: I don't think she would have understood it.

I believe you should treat others as you wish to be treated yourself. But it is galling to be edited by someone who has little experience - in life, in work, in reading, in anything - and is still forming their adult teeth, talent aside.

James Lloyd Davis
Jul 10, 03:09pm

Lighten up, folks, really.

It's hardly an attack on young people to express wonder at the age of the gatekeepers in public literature, especially when you reach my age and begin to express wonder at how young everyone is in general, a point of perspective. A point of humor, not contention.

If Dylan Thomas and Rimbaud are out there as teenagers, I think we'll recognize their gift. If they are out there at fifty, at sixty, I hope we'll recognize them as well. Genius will find its way through whatever obstacles that would stand against it.

If you want to defend the defenseless, pick a fight, start a revolution, end poverty, end bigotry, end hunger and oppression, by all means do it ... but don't take humor out of the world in the process.

Ann Bogle
Jul 10, 04:07pm

Not long ago, a poet of some influence, whose work deserves special consideration, told me that editors at Gulf Coast had returned his S.A.S.E. empty, without a rejection slip and without the poems he had sent them. I immediately thought that the editors there (graduate students) couldn't be bothered with clerical detail. I even thought they might have been sabotaging my friend's greater gifts. I thought they were young, true. Yet when I was the same age (25), I worked as assistant editor at John Gardner's journal, MSS. My approach to running the office was to be accurate and efficient. That way takes immature ego out of it. It didn't stop talent from emerging if it came in the mail, and it reassured subscribers and contributors that someone capable -- though I was "young" -- was on deck.

Joani Reese
Jul 10, 04:33pm

Funny story: The respected lit. mag. I worked on as a grad student in 2000 and 2001 sent me back my SASE with a template rejection cut out that was about two by two inches. I might have missed it entirely had I not upended the envelope and shook it. The best part is I had sent poetry and creative non-fiction, but the rejection didn't mention which was rejected. A few weeks later, I received the second tiny insult. : )

MaryAnne Kolton
Jul 10, 04:52pm

Lest anyone think otherwise, my original observations were made half in surprise and half in jest. I realize that there are many, many talented young people in this world that take their art and their responsibilities quite seriously. I happen to be mother to two of them.

At this particular time in our world it takes a huge amount of dedication, courage and talent to start, let alone maintain any kind of literary site. I applaud those who do, and do it well, while so many around them are failing.

Perhaps I was wearing my grumpy face the day I posted my earlier comments. As a woman of a certain age I have been subjected to discrimination in the workplace and called "hon" or "dear" by someone young enough to be my grandchild more often than I care to think about. How lovely to be able to write and submit and be rewarded or not on the relative merits of my work alone.

This particular knife cuts both ways, folks. As JLD so wisely said, "If Dylan Thomas and Rimbaud are out there as teenagers, I think we'll recognize their gift. If they are out there at fifty, at sixty, I hope we'll recognize them as well. Genius will find its way through whatever obstacles that would stand against it."

MaryAnne Kolton
Jul 10, 04:58pm

JP, thank you. Your story voices exactly the tone I was hoping to create when I started this thread. . .

Susan Tepper
Jul 10, 09:02pm

When I started submitting 17 yrs ago (gulp) it was all envelopes and paper and clips and lots of stamps. Big envelope out and nbr. 10 back. It was expensive and getting rejected a lot took a hit on your wallet. I never send out by paper now. I avoid those places, and figure that sooner or later they will come into this century and learn about submishmash. It is much less annoying to be rejected by email (in my opinion) than one of those crappy pieces of paper that we were told (back then) had levels: the long sheet with the embossed name and a signature was a GOOD REJECTION. The short piece of paper with a signature still signalled hope. The scrap form letter meant they hated what you sent.

Looking back on all that nonsense, it seems so crazy. I did get a long embossed one, signed, in 1997 from Granta. That story never got published anywhere. Despite that I must've sent it out 100 times.
So there you go!
I should have gone to medical school!!!

Meg Tuite
Jul 10, 09:20pm

MaryAnne,
I'm just so happy they saw how amazing your writing was!!! Now those are some great editors!! Have fun in Chgo!!!
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