‘I Hate This Essay’
This comment came late to Mike Young’s ‘Magazine Debasers’ essay. I wanted to post it here, because it is cute.
Anonymous comments:
I hate this essay. This is all about the insular world of MFA “writing.” And if the author was at a “top tier” journal, he wouldn’t have written it. But his own journal isn’t even third-tier so he has to come up with this essay to defend it.
Truth is, most journals are full of sloppy writing, soft ideas, poor thinking, and all manner of third-rate junk.
I hate the MFA world. I am an independent: no degree, no connection to universities. I am a writer and I am published.
Here’s my criteria for submitting to a magazine. It’s simple. I just look at how much they pay. That’s number one. Second is the audience. I look at their circulation (if it’s print) or their hits / ad rate (if it’s onine). I’d sacrifice a little pay for more eyeballs, sometimes, but it’s all about the money.
In other words, 95% of those “journals” are immediate nos for me, since they don’t pay squat.
But that’s how writing should be. It’s how it used to be. If more writers went independent, and avoided the MFA schoolteacher CV “credit” world completely, then there would be less of these lame journals and maybe more real outlets that paid.
Remember, a magazine pays its writers because the magazine is professional, the writers who work for them are pros, and above all they have *readers*. These lamebrain unpaying journals don’t have any of that. Who want them? Not me.
Hooray!
AWP Chicago: A Human Being’s Notes
Browsing through the many post-AWP posts for something that does something that I don’t know what, maybe something worth mentioning, or something else, I found this up at Agni (via the Newpages blog): ‘AWP Chicago: A Gamer’s Notes’ by JS Tunotre. I read it and tried to think of how it applied to my AWP experience. I found myself resisting it, wanting to respond. Then I told myself I wasn’t going to post about AWP, especially not one of those ‘thank-you’ posts to everyone (which are fine and fun to read, but there are just so many of them, and I can only read so much about how weird it is to meet people in real life whom you’ve only known online). But I changed my mind today when I realized that I couldn’t focus on the student papers piled on my desk. So here goes:
Before you read on, recall that we’ve already talked a little bit about the ‘submissions game’ here, so maybe this AWP post will pick up a little bit where Mike Young left off?
And if you haven’t, please read Blake Butler’s BE AN OPEN NODE post for some more thoughts that sort of go with what I’m thinking here.
So, to the essay. Give it a quick read, then come back and let’s talk. Also, you should know that I’m reading/responding to JS Tunotre’s essay honestly. I’m aware of its satirical qualities, its humor, etc, but I think Tunotre is describing a common perception about AWP, publishing, writing, and so on that I want to treat as a serious argument, despite his framing it in gamer’s language. We can also discuss how serious Tunotre is about this issue in the comments.
Okay, enough delay. My first question after you’ve read the essay is this: does Tunotre speak for you?
I am speaking here for all of us who still cannot walk into a room, a literary arena, without immediately seeing it as a complexly graded hierarchy, a scarcely disguised Hobbesian jungle, tyrannized over not by teeth and claws, but by their verbal equivalents.
Probably not, unless you are a robot, in which case you are probably small and round and vacuuming up all of the crap after everyone leaves town.
Or you are insanely intelligent, live alone in a garrett that you never leave, and write very long books, in which case you have no experience with crowds anyhow.
But seriously, does Tunotre speak for you? I’m curious to hear from people who think of AWP this way (or any other social interaction for that matter).
Fairy Tale Review Opens Submissions
Fairy Tale Review wants your Little Red Hiding Hood-related submissions.
The Red Issue will be Fairy Tale Review’s sixth annual issue and, as the color suggests, will be as as devoted to Little Red Riding Hood as was dear Mr. Dickens. This is will be the journal’s first truly themed issue and we welcome your newest and brightest writing to it.
They’re reading submissions from Feb 15th to June 15th.
Read their call for submissions.
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February 22nd, 2009 / 9:30 pm
February 22nd, 2009 / 9:30 pm
Gigantic
Gigantic, a magazine run by James Yeh, Rozi Jovanovich, Lincoln Michel, and Ann DeWitt will soon be swelling hands in awful ways. How soon? April soon.
From the website:
Gigantic #1 arriving April 2009
Debut issue featuring:
-Deb Olin Unferth and Joe Wenderoth In conversation on the influences of “bad art.”
-New work from Ed Park, Shane Jones, Pedro Ponce, Justin Taylor, along with other new and exciting voices.
-Gary Shteyngart on meat.
-Line Drawings, collages and photography both odd and beautiful.
-Tao Lin asks Malcolm Gladwell some questions and also talks about genius, hamsters and, well, Malcolm Gladwell.
No sign yet as to how you might buy a copy, but the editors promise that it will be cheap and will cost ‘very little compared to other literary journals.’ Keep on eye on their website for information.
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February 19th, 2009 / 3:56 am
February 19th, 2009 / 3:56 am
$5 For You!
So, I’ve got here in my wallet a gift card to Powell’s Books, a gift card that I did not realize I had. It has $5 dollars on it. I would like to mail it to someone as a giveaway, but that someone has to earn it. Basically, what I’m interested in hearing is a story about someone’s experience at a bookstore, any bookstore, good or bad experience, and so on. I will judge what story I like the best and then get that person’s mailing address somehow. I will announce whose story I liked on Wednesday morning, and then whoever told that story will be the winner, if that makes sense.
Okay, my lame story is this: I first went to Powell’s a few years ago while I was at the Tin House conference. A bunch of us took the bus into town, missed our stop, and then had to walk a lot of blocks back over some bridge to the store. In Powell’s, I felt overwhelmed. The shelves were very very tall. I could not reach certain shelves. I walked back and forth through the shelves and gawked at the amount of books that were on the shelves. I am someone who is only familiar with Barnes & Nobles, so yeah. Then, maybe about ten minutes before we were to leave, I found the ‘independent’ shelves. These shelves were on a back wall and next to them I found the ‘literary journals.’ On the literary journal shelves I found the 2005 and 2006 issues of NOON and Pindeldyboz #3. I bought the two issues of NOON but left the Pboz. I regret that decision. I think about it all the time. I regret it. I should have bought all three. Somewhere out there is a Pboz #3 that I did not purchase. I suppose I could go to the website and order one of the five issues that are left, but I sometimes think I’d rather just whine about the whole thing instead.
Anyhow, post your bookstore stories in the comments section, if you’d like. Or, if you want, you may email them to our HTMLGIANT email address.
‘I eat books’
Scott Esposito has begun posting at Conversational Reading a series of interviews with various publishers of small presses. Here’s what he has to say about the series:
In order to get some a picture of how publishing beyond New York’s giants is faring, I’m going to be conducting interviews with presses and publishing them here. I’ll be interested to see if they’re feeling the pain every bit as much as the big guys, or if their different publishing models are yielding different results. I’ll also want to see what they’re doing to stay competitive in this market and if they think the recession is going to shake up publishing at large.
So far he’s heard from Declan Spring of New Directions, Fred Ramey of Unbridled Books, and Richard Nash of Soft Skull/Counterpoint.
The series can be read at this link.
Magic Helicopter Press Seeks Pilots
I posted this at the NOÖ blog, but wanted to post here as well.
Mike and I will have a remote control mini-helicopter at AWP. We will raffle this helicopter off to a lucky AWP-goer. If you’d like to enter your name in the raffle, come by our table (we’ll be sharing with Publishing Genius Press and No Colony), donate some money or buy one of our Magic Helicopter Press chapbooks, and we’ll enter you in the drawing.
In the meantime, we’ll be flying the helicopter around the bookfair, demonstrating our skillz, etc.
Here is a video of the helicopter doing what helicopters do. When you watch the video, imagine lots of authors in that room, sweating and being scared; that is what AWP will be like:
Of course, if Black Warrior Review hands out those fly-swatters they had in Atlanta, then we might be in trouble.
Word Spaces(5): Kim Chinquee
Kim Chinquee is the author of Oh Baby, a collection of short shorts from Ravenna Press. She has won a Pushcart Prize. Her work has appeared in various places, online and in print: 3:am, Caketrain, Conjunctions, elimae, Fiction, Hobart, Keyhole, NOON, Phoebe, Post Road, Sleepingfish, Willow Springs, etc. She teaches at Buffalo State College. It is cold up there, I imagine. Probably snowy also.
I had to include Phoebe in that list, as that’s how I first really saw her work up close, if that makes sense. I emailed with Kim after accepting a handful of her short short pieces for an issue. I was (and still am) impressed with the precision of her writing. The stories in the collection are tiny and wonderful. So, if you happen to miss out on the giveaway, you really should click over to Ravenna Press and order a copy of her book all the same.
Here’s what Kim has to say about her new office, which she just moved into last year upon arriving in Buffalo:
This is my home office, a corner of my studio apartment, and I took this photo after moving to Buffalo in August. It’s a little different now, more “moved in,” so to speak, with papers and tablets and books and the drawers are sometimes open, and I’ve been working on a laptop.
The window looks down into a courtyard, that was pretty colorful in August. Now, mostly snow, and it’s really nice when the sun is
shining. I’m on the fourth floor. The bookshelf belongs to my son, who didn’t think he could fit it in his dorm room back in college, and some of the books are his: books on drawing, guitar, and lots of classics. On the top shelves, I’ve included books by my teachers and friends and favorite writers and journals. Some CDs, mostly classical: Ravel, Chopin and Mozart, though I don’t listen to music while writing, only when I’m sending out work, responding to an email. One of the paintings I made as an undergrad rests on top of the bookshelf, but only because I don’t have the heart to throw it out, and I don’t know where else to put it.A framed picture of my son sits by my computer, a recent photo from his high school graduation.
The desk is new for me, but a very old desk, from a generous
colleague. We both left Michigan at the same time; she moved to Boston, and didn’t have the space. I did, and didn’t have a desk of my own. It’s huge. It’s heavy. It’s ancient and holds everything.I spend the majority of my time at this desk. It’s the first place I
go when I wake up, though I do most of my writing late into the night. The chair is pretty comfortable, though I never sit in it the way I’m supposed to. I sometimes prop my feet up on a stool underneath the desk. Or I curl up, sitting at odd angles, like right now, as I write this.
Thanks, Kim, for sharing, and thanks, everyone, for reading.
And now, another book giveaway; I asked Kim if she would like to send a free copy of her book to a lucky HTMLGIANT reader, and she agreed. So you have until, let’s say, noon CST tomorrow (1.22.09) to email us your mailing address; subject line of the email should be OH BABY. If you’ve already won something, maybe step out of this one, thanks. I’ll let you know if the random integer generator smiled upon you. Send to htmlgiant [at] gmail [dot] com.
UPDATE: Congratulations to Evelyn Hampton, winner of the Oh Baby giveaway. Thank you to the other people who entered the contest – one day your time will come.
Paper Egg Books welcomes you to the nest
Aaron Burch reminded me that I had posted about Paper Egg Books a while ago, and he said new things are going on over there, things everyone ought to check out.
So I checked it out and am now out $50. That’s right, a 3yr subscription to Paper Egg Books will cost you $50 but guarantees that you’ll receive two books a year for the next three years. I like that idea.
So, goodbye, Ulysses S. Grant. Hello Paper Egg Books.
Paper Egg has also announced a few things that make me excited about my 3yr subscription. Because I am lazy, I have simply copied and pasted from their website the following two ‘press releases’:
The Great Paul Hornschemeier, he of the prodigious illustrative talents and author of numerous fantastic Fantagraphics books, will illustrate and design every edition of Paper Egg. As much as this little effort is something of a throwback, we wanted to embrace the old-school methods of having each Paper Egg contain similar design elements, so that as you line them up on your shelves year after year, they begin to amass a sort of group mind. To that end, Paul will work closely with featherproof design guru Zach Dodson to create our new line of books. And, of course, Paul will illustrate each Egg.
Really, we couldn’t have found a finer artist for the job, as Paul has done some incredible book design work in the past, and each of his own books—including Mother, Come Homeand The Three Paradoxes—combines all that we love in art: a technician’s eye, an impish sense of humor, and enough melancholy mixed in that we can never quite set our compass right.
If you’re not acquainted with Paul’s work, please, please acquaint yourself.
And:
So now that you know what we’re doing, how we’re doing it, it’s time to tell you what we have in store. For our first Paper Egg, we’ll be sending you The Awful Possibilities by Christian Tebordo. It’s Christian’s first collection of short stories, and anyone who’s familiar with his past work knows it’s got to be dark, beautiful, strange, and the kind of book that opens new doors with every page turned.
A little background: I’m lucky enough to hold off the bill collectors with my job as the editor of Time Out Chicago’s Books section. When Christian’s first novel, The Conviction and Subsequent Life of Savior Neck came across my desk in 2005, I was blown away. I had one of those nights where I didn’t fall asleep until a couple of hours before work, when the book was finally done. Since then, he’s followed it up with Better Ways of Being Dead (awesome) and We Go Liquid (amazing). So when we decided to launch Paper Egg, it was obvious to me that we should to start off right with a book from Christian. In fact, in some sense, Paper Egg was designed to publish Christian’s book. It’s brilliant, and strange, and the mammoth bookselling network is simply not suited for something like it. We’re hoping we are.
To read a great Ned Vizzini interview with Christian, go here, and one of his stories at La Petite Zine.
I am going to go check my mailbox now. While I’m gone, why don’t you visit their website, see how it works, and then subscribe.
Is StoryQuarterly back?
the rutgers-camden mfa program celebrates acquiring storyquarterly
Cliff Garstang has done a bit of detective work and discovered some news about StoryQuarterly. He writes at his blog:
[T]oday I was browsing the exhibitors that are scheduled to appear at AWP 2009 in Chicago next month and I noticed that “MFA at Rutgers” is sharing a table with StoryQuarterly. I checked on the web and read all about the new MFA program at Rutgers that Jayne Anne Phillips is directing, but that didn’t answer my question. Then I Googled “MFA at Rutgers” AND “StoryQuarterly” and made a very interesting discovery.
According to this press release, Rutgers University-Camden acquired StoryQuarterly in October. They plan to continue the annual publication and also plan an online publication that was supposed to have begun in the fall. Following the links, I got to a new website for StoryQuarterly, although it doesn’t give much information about how the revived magazine will operate, other than to say that Marie Hayes will continue as a consultant.
This is interesting, considering all of the hype that came out of Narrative Magazine‘s announcement that they had taken over StoryQuarterly and would continue to publish it in print annually. Cliff Garstang wants to know what happened with all of that, and I’m curious as well.
I think it would be great to see StoryQuarterly back in action, if only to know that a magazine with that kind of history carries on. For example, looking through a few back issue tables of contents in the ’90s will give you a glimpse of the makings of NOON, a result of Diane Williams editorial hand, and you can see work from Christine Schutt, Gary Lutz, Lorrie Moore, Deb Olin Unferth, etc. Obviously, you can find their work in their full length books, I think, but it’s interesting to see it in some bigger context, I suppose, other than a story collection. Lorrie Moore’s story “How to Talk to Your Mother (Notes)” appears in Self-Help, but was published in StoryQuarterly in the early ’80s – it was her second publication, if what I’ve read is correct. And this interview between Ben Marcus and Brian Evenson originally appeared in StoryQuarterly #31.
That is all for now – look for a hardcopy issue of StoryQuarterly to be published this summer. I know nothing else other than the webmaster at StoryQuarterly appears to have a sense of humor when it comes to posting submission guidelines – click on the Frequently Asked Questions link.
Uncategorized / 18 Comments
January 18th, 2009 / 3:27 pm
January 18th, 2009 / 3:27 pm