June 14th, 2010 / 4:33 pm
Behind the Scenes
Sean Lovelace
Behind the Scenes
Say What?
My friend recently received this rejection (?) from magazine-I-shall-not-name. Your opinion?
Dear (name withheld),
Thank you for submitting your work to the (name withheld)
While your submission made it into the later stages of my consideration. After having a chance to reread your submission, at least once aloud, I must tell you that I will not be able to use any of your poems in this upcoming issue.
I know that a rejection almost always seems to be a personal thing–but seriously, I am only rejecting the poems you sent in this submission. If you’re poems made it this far into the process then I think you possess the talent and I would recommend/encourage you submit during the next reading period.
Best,
sweet
encouraging
seems really standard to me, what’s the problem?
“possess the talent”
I don’t see anything wrong with this. It’s rather informative about the editorial process.
two pretty egregious errors in that rejection letter. i feel pretty snarky about an editor who accidentally writes sentence fragments and confuses “your”/”you’re”
i mean besides the broken language, which seems pretty common in these things
I’m with the mob. Getting letters that encourage you to keep submitting is a huge step up from receiving form rejection after form rejection.
I’m with Stephen. Getting letters that indicate you’re submitting to idiots is a huge step up from receiving form rejections from people you can actually respect.
1) numerous errors
2) half-brained implication that the poems are not as good when spoken aloud? (why bother making such an implication without also enclosing a real thought to go with it? Frustrating.)
3) “but seriously” (?)
4) “possess the talent”
Reads like a lazy college freshman wrote this.
LOL
I didn’t find it, egregious, don’t get me wrong. But I didn’t find it standard.
I just thought it odd and wanted to see what the community here thought.
I thought maybe it was sent drunk. That was my first impression, and I’ve done such things, so.
And I actually don’t find the language standard. Most editors have a standard rejection, but this was a different thing, obviously the poems made it up the line. I just sort of found it hilarious to take the time to send a personal response and this was what you SENT.
I told my friend to check the email time. My theory was drink-N-Email.
Then again, I’m a veteran of such late night nonsense.
hehe. i guess i write responses so off the cuff myself that i’m not suprised. i like antiformality. but yeah, this was probably a drunk or a freshman. or a drunk freshman.
it actually does have this weird dual speak voice where it’s acting editorial and not making clean sense. i like it actually.
“I like you a lot, but I think our relationship is moving a little too fast. I just don’t know if I’m ready to make this exclusive. But seriously, it’s not you. It’s just where my head is at right now.”
I like it too.
thought it was an interesting addition to the genre.
I keep seeing a yellow scratched desk and a bottle of something and like some gal leaning back in one of those metal chairs you find in church basements and she’s feeling all glow and legs floating and the fucking computer FINALLY gets her on the dial-up and she’s got this little slush pile, all sliding angles and smudged ink, and she hits this Swisher Sweets while thinking, “OK, let’s send out these final rejections tonight…”
Basically, she’s a poet, I’m saying.
Luckily I’m only rejecting the work you submitted so you may as well try again.
haha. ok, ‘luckily’ is funny.
Good call, Matthew. The vibe was odd too. Teasing and slam at the same time.
Hey!–it’s really tough for Dad to dance at Screamin’ Meemies, coach my hockey team and edit a top-flight literary magazine. Maybe he mixes the reds and the blues now and again, but never his metaphors, Lovelace! Never his metaphors!
Rachel F, will you marry me?
Editors should use at least half-way decent grammar. This email is horrible!
I would’ve responded to this one.
“Unfortunately, I can’t accept your rejection. While it made the first cut, rejections that confuse ‘your’ with ‘you’re’ and contain sentence fragments are not a good fit for my work. Best of luck placing your rejection elsewhere.”
I don’t find this funny or clever, and I have a great sense of humor. There’s a certain strain of Educated Person Snark that is just like an unstoppable mutant virus in the blogosphere, and I never find it funny or clever. I can’t figure out why you put the idiots part first instead of the form rejections part. Somehow there’s twice the sarcasm/”humor” if you put it out of order??? All three of you confuse me, and I’m just being honest, I’m not feeling mean or anything like that. Just confused by yall. This is humor? This is a quality you love in a person?
Illiterati Rules.
sweet
encouraging
seems really standard to me, what’s the problem?
“possess the talent”
I don’t see anything wrong with this. It’s rather informative about the editorial process.
two pretty egregious errors in that rejection letter. i feel pretty snarky about an editor who accidentally writes sentence fragments and confuses “your”/”you’re”
i mean besides the broken language, which seems pretty common in these things
i h8 myself
I’m with the mob. Getting letters that encourage you to keep submitting is a huge step up from receiving form rejection after form rejection.
stephen,
it was a sarcastic lol.
I’m with Stephen. Getting letters that indicate you’re submitting to idiots is a huge step up from receiving form rejections from people you can actually respect.
1) numerous errors
2) half-brained implication that the poems are not as good when spoken aloud? (why bother making such an implication without also enclosing a real thought to go with it? Frustrating.)
3) “but seriously” (?)
4) “possess the talent”
Reads like a lazy college freshman wrote this.
LOL
I didn’t find it, egregious, don’t get me wrong. But I didn’t find it standard.
I just thought it odd and wanted to see what the community here thought.
I thought maybe it was sent drunk. That was my first impression, and I’ve done such things, so.
And I actually don’t find the language standard. Most editors have a standard rejection, but this was a different thing, obviously the poems made it up the line. I just sort of found it hilarious to take the time to send a personal response and this was what you SENT.
I told my friend to check the email time. My theory was drink-N-Email.
Then again, I’m a veteran of such late night nonsense.
hehe. i guess i write responses so off the cuff myself that i’m not suprised. i like antiformality. but yeah, this was probably a drunk or a freshman. or a drunk freshman.
it actually does have this weird dual speak voice where it’s acting editorial and not making clean sense. i like it actually.
“I like you a lot, but I think our relationship is moving a little too fast. I just don’t know if I’m ready to make this exclusive. But seriously, it’s not you. It’s just where my head is at right now.”
I like it too.
thought it was an interesting addition to the genre.
I keep seeing a yellow scratched desk and a bottle of something and like some gal leaning back in one of those metal chairs you find in church basements and she’s feeling all glow and legs floating and the fucking computer FINALLY gets her on the dial-up and she’s got this little slush pile, all sliding angles and smudged ink, and she hits this Swisher Sweets while thinking, “OK, let’s send out these final rejections tonight…”
Basically, she’s a poet, I’m saying.
Luckily I’m only rejecting the work you submitted so you may as well try again.
haha. ok, ‘luckily’ is funny.
Good call, Matthew. The vibe was odd too. Teasing and slam at the same time.
Hey!–it’s really tough for Dad to dance at Screamin’ Meemies, coach my hockey team and edit a top-flight literary magazine. Maybe he mixes the reds and the blues now and again, but never his metaphors, Lovelace! Never his metaphors!
Rachel F, will you marry me?
Editors should use at least half-way decent grammar. This email is horrible!
I would’ve responded to this one.
“Unfortunately, I can’t accept your rejection. While it made the first cut, rejections that confuse ‘your’ with ‘you’re’ and contain sentence fragments are not a good fit for my work. Best of luck placing your rejection elsewhere.”
I don’t find this funny or clever, and I have a great sense of humor. There’s a certain strain of Educated Person Snark that is just like an unstoppable mutant virus in the blogosphere, and I never find it funny or clever. I can’t figure out why you put the idiots part first instead of the form rejections part. Somehow there’s twice the sarcasm/”humor” if you put it out of order??? All three of you confuse me, and I’m just being honest, I’m not feeling mean or anything like that. Just confused by yall. This is humor? This is a quality you love in a person?
this rejection could be more comedic if the sender reversed the beginning and ending so that it basically read like “Listen you’re great and you made it into my final deliberations and I really look forward to what you do in the future and I really liked your poems and all, but I have to say that there is just no way.”
Illiterati Rules.
That’s the sort of brokenness that happens when I send e-mails from my smart phone…
So…maybe that’s it. It’s hard to catch mistakes early in the e-mail (in this post, for example, I’m not even able to scroll up to view the first line^^)
i h8 myself
stephen,
it was a sarcastic lol.
this rejection could be more comedic if the sender reversed the beginning and ending so that it basically read like “Listen you’re great and you made it into my final deliberations and I really look forward to what you do in the future and I really liked your poems and all, but I have to say that there is just no way.”
everybody i would just like to say that while i was pretty happy when i read your comments, i got down to the bottom and read this one out loud and i’m afraid everybody else is just not going to make the cut. i would recommend/encourage that you comment on another post and get it right next time like Trey here.
That’s the sort of brokenness that happens when I send e-mails from my smart phone…
So…maybe that’s it. It’s hard to catch mistakes early in the e-mail (in this post, for example, I’m not even able to scroll up to view the first line^^)
everybody i would just like to say that while i was pretty happy when i read your comments, i got down to the bottom and read this one out loud and i’m afraid everybody else is just not going to make the cut. i would recommend/encourage that you comment on another post and get it right next time like Trey here.
damn straight y’all
The weird thing is “I must say”. Why must they say? They are obviously saying it. Usually it is used to emphasize something: “I must say that you are a total prick.” It would be polite if it was “I must say that I loved the poems.” But since they didn’t, “I must say” turns into a negative. Which means either:
a) the person really did hate the poems after reading them aloud
or
b) the person hasn’t quite grasped the English language yet
I really like the “but seriously.”
damn straight y’all
The weird thing is “I must say”. Why must they say? They are obviously saying it. Usually it is used to emphasize something: “I must say that you are a total prick.” It would be polite if it was “I must say that I loved the poems.” But since they didn’t, “I must say” turns into a negative. Which means either:
a) the person really did hate the poems after reading them aloud
or
b) the person hasn’t quite grasped the English language yet
I really like the “but seriously.”
Gah. I hate writing rejections. & I’m pretty sure I’m terrible at it. I mean, the thing is, if you’re sending anything other than the form rejection, it’s because you really like the person’s work, and for one reason or another it just didn’t make the cut. So non-formal rejections lend themselves to this sort of double-talk (I like it, I can’t take it). Here’s hoping one of my “nice” rejections doesn’t come up for critique…
Gah. I hate writing rejections. & I’m pretty sure I’m terrible at it. I mean, the thing is, if you’re sending anything other than the form rejection, it’s because you really like the person’s work, and for one reason or another it just didn’t make the cut. So non-formal rejections lend themselves to this sort of double-talk (I like it, I can’t take it). Here’s hoping one of my “nice” rejections doesn’t come up for critique…
Rejector seems to go overboard trying to soften the rejection’s impact. So perhaps even the poor wording was intentional so the rejectee could definitely feel superior to the reluctant rejector.
holy analysis batman
Rejector seems to go overboard trying to soften the rejection’s impact. So perhaps even the poor wording was intentional so the rejectee could definitely feel superior to the reluctant rejector.
sorry, but if i got a rejection like that, with so many mistakes, especially the your/you’re, i’d never submit again
sorry, but if i got a rejection like that, with so many mistakes, especially the your/you’re, i’d never submit again