Get An Eyeshot of This

Here's a dude who loves the rejections he writes to others so much that he posts them voluminously for the world (and his literary magazine readers) to see.  (Click on the volume number to get to the other six pages of rejections in case you are so inclined.)  

One word about Lee Klein from me: Wow.

I learned of this phenomenon from the man himself, who wrote me an email with a link to his rejections and an invitation (perhaps challenge) to submit to his site, Eyeshot.net.  

Wrote he, "Maybe send something for Eyeshot, award-winning writer..." 

My response:  "Um, no thanks."  But he is welcome for the publicity, and I do wish him peace and light.

The Writer's Life

Here's an interesting article on rejection by TJ Sullivan.  Above is a photo of his first novel, rejected and returned.  Haven't we all been there?

Evident Merit, My Ass

Dear Writer, Rejected:

I am hoping that you have some familiarity with rejections from the "shouts and murmurs" column at The New Yorker.

I submitted a piece to them via e-mail on August 6. Barely 5 days later, I received this response:

We're sorry to say that this piece, "Living Your Dreams Backwards," wasn't right for us, despite its evident merit. Thank you for allowing us to consider your work.

Best regards,
The Shouts Dept.

I wondered in the back of my mind whether "evident merit" was just a stock phrase they threw around to keep people from getting upset but didn't think much of it until almost two months later, when I received this e-mail on October 3:

We're sorry to say that this piece wasn't right for us, but thanks very much for letting us consider your work, and we sincerely apologize for the delay in responding.

Best regards,
The Shouts Dept.

I've only e-mailed them once in my life, so the second, unprovoked response was puzzling. And a bit of a kick over something I was already down about, honestly.

Is the "evident merit" phrase something that they use in an "encouraging" rejection letter, or is it just their version of "those pants don't make your ass look big"? In the two months that elapsed, did it lose its merit, or are they only capable of providing either apologies or encouragement but not both? 

Thanks,

Anonymous Writer (PMJG)

______________

Dear AW: 

I'd have to say from my years of rejection experience from said magazine that both the letter and the email seem very much like standard New Yorker form letters to me.  Sorry to break the bad news. If you want to send your S & M piece here, I'll post it for discussion.  The New Yorker probably wouldn't know funny if funny bit it in the big-looking-ass pants.  

Keep the faith, Bro-- W,R.

Cartoon You and Your Rejections

Seems like we're not the only ones obsessed with literary failure and rejection. Guess it's good to have a laugh over it once in a while.

The Green Frownie Face Inside Us All

There's an interview of me over at HTML GIANT, a weird, but interesting new site, my current websession.  

"What Writers Fail to Realize" (Please.)

In case you didn't know the real scoop about WRITING, people, here's what an anonymous commenter (called D. Kollar) has to tell you today on a post from December about the business you're in:

"I met with Mr. [Jeff] Kleinman a week ago at a writer's conference in Indiana to pitch my novel. He told me the idea was good but the book was not ready to be published. Although, this was a rejection, I valued his advice and after he told me what to do, I agreed and found the information helpful.

I think writers fail to realize this is a business, plain and simple. Agents may like many of the books they look at, but they only have time to represent the ones they love. I don't like form letters, but they are a necessary evil if an agent receives hundreds of query letters a month. Because really, when would they have the time to represent the authors they do have and make the money necessary to live if they spent time writing individual letters and going into depth about why they won't accept your manuscript.

It really comes down to this: if the idea and the writing don't absolutely wow the agent, they will not accept it. So you fix the problem, continue to learn, send a query letter to another agent, or you give up. But nobody has ever said that getting a book published is easy. Otherwise, everyone would have a story to sell. This career is only for those who don't give up.

D. Kollar"

Thanks for news flash about nothing we didn't already know, buddy.

Typical Southern Hospitality

Contrary to the laughing at you The Virginia Quarterly (VQR) does behind your back, here's a sampling of their official rejection form:

Dear Writer:

Thanks for your recent submission to VQR: "Title of Story." While the piece had obvious merit it just doesn't fit our needs at present. We wish we could offer a more personal response to your submission, but the number of manuscripts we receive makes this impossible. Please know, however, that we've read your work and appreciate your interest in our journal. Please do keep us in mind in the future.

Best regards,
The Editors

Seems like a pack of lies now that we know what really goes on.

Archival Rejection Letters

Just wanted to share a bit of rejection history with you.  

The Saturday Evening Post eventually went out of business, and I'm sure MOMA was later sorry to have turned down Andy Warhol's drawing.  As for Ms. Ford, she became a well respected illustrator for Disney during World War II when many women became acceptable for positions previously closed-off to them because the men went off to war.  (Just goes to show that a rejection is not necessarily the end of the story.)

Jacob Appel Awarded a GAK!

Not just because he's won yet another friggin' contest, but because I LOVE this man in both homo and hetero ways (I am third gendered, after all), I hereby award Jacob M. Appel (dude of many degrees) with the second annual Golden Apple of Kindness (GAK!) Award.  You will see I added his award to the right side of my blog under the first and most distinguished awardee, Rosemary Ahern.  (I may or may not refrain from writing a series of romantic literary posts about him as I did about her....we'll see.)

Anyway, congratulations Jacob.  Despite the fact that you win every contest I lose, you are a good guy!  A decent human being!  And an inspiration!  Congratulations!

p.s. As soon as my novel is published, I'll reveal my true identity, and we'll have lunch.  Anyone who can get to NYC is invited to come along.  We'll make it a media event to get the publicity we all deserve.

Eyeshot Eyeroll (Or, How to Overwrite A Rejection)

An anonymous writer has words to say about the journal Eyeshot.  Says he:  "For those that don't know, part of the fun of submitting to eyeshot is the rejection. (Actually, that's the only part of the fun I know so far!!)"

Here's the rejection from editor Lee Klein: "Man submits story. Editor reads it. Man wrote sentences. Short ones. Editor likes long ones. Or short ones. If they are about. Eating out menstruating she-lions. Through specially designed dreamcatchers. But sentences are about same-old stupid fighting. Man and woman fighting. Editor does not know why Man would think Editor or anyone would post this? Editor wonders if Man thinks this sort of thing. Is syntaxically interesting? More interesting formally than interesting content? Or good prose? With syntax that disappears to generously reveal images for a reader? Editor sighs. Man sighs. Editor says good luck. Man wants to say, Eat a dick. Man says nothing. Man does not cry. Man reconsiders. Man reads Tolstoy and understands. Editor makes broccoli and yams. Then writes till the 76ers and Yanks games come on! Woohoo!"

You can't see me right now, but I'm rolling my eyes at how bad this rejection is.  The writing makes me want to throw myself under a bus.

$3 Bill is Nonrefundable in Massachusetts

Apparently the folks over at Massachusetts Review are requiring a $3 fee for electronic submissions, which though sad, is probably the wave of the future.  Because Pay Pal can be such a mess, you might want to think twice about submitting...because if the story doesn't get processed, you may not get your money back.  See details of one such harrowing story here.

Sorry, We Only Publish Fakes

Here's a story you can find in full over at A Salted Blog.  Seems the writer sent out a flash fiction piece to an unnamed literary journal, and got a rejection back immediately.  Says the writer, "The editor said he didn't like it, he thought it was unrefined and sloppy writing that needed revision. Right. Cheers. Anyway, I thought he was a bit rude, but assumed he is a young dude trying to make a name as a fearsome editor of scrupulously worded fiction. I told a writer friend, who went to a greeking generator and mixed up some chunks of random text with expletives, and sent it to the editor along with a preposterous bio."  Long story short, the editor published the bunk piece of writing.  Alas, they do love the f-word.

New Delta Review Responds

Re: the above rejection from New Delta Review, we have an explanation!  NDR Editor-in-Chief, Benjamin Lowenkron, and Chief-Mischiefmaker, "Assmunch," came around LROD with the following entertaining comments:

new said...

Blogospherites,

Believe it or not, this is the current Editor-in-Chief of NDR, Benjamin Lowenkron. Our journal has a high rate of turn-over on the staff because we are 100% run by graduate students. So, every now and then, an assmunch who thinks he is hilarious happens to stumble onto the staff. I am not sure when or who sent out that rejection (though I have a few ideas), but it is not our practice to insult and antagonize our contributors. Our nornal rejection slip simple informs the writer that their piece did not find a home at NDR.

That being said, I do think the letter is hilarious, and that people take rejections way too seriously (there are an infinite number of reasons a piece gets rejected, and I have plenty of rejections of my own work sitting around my office). Though I would not send this sort of rejection out, I have to admit the thought has crossed my mind on a few occasions - for example, the time we received a letter smeared in cat feces from someone who we rejected (with the normal rejection), informing us that his/her story got picked up by a "better journal." No joke. Anyway, we here at New Delta Review welcome all submissions, and as always, stop idiot be.

-Benjamin S. Lowenkron, Editor, New Delta Review

the assmunch said...
Not only was it meant as a joke, it was never meant to get out. As the "assmunch" in question (got to love a boss with such careful attention to word choice), I feel somewhat drawn to clear it all up.

We were out of rejection slips a few days back, and (yes, due to the massive turnover) had to search everywhere for the original document which contained the form letter. Once I found it, I amended it slightly as a joke, and saved two versions of the slip (the original, and the joke). Then, one page was printed containing three of the joke slips, and was passed around the office (though not to the EiC).

Apparently, it got mixed up in the pages of actual form letters I printed off that day. For that, I am sorry. I'd like to assure the three people that mistakenly got the joke rejection that it was completely random (as well as accidental), and not indicative of a particularly poor quality of work. Not to say that the stories in question didn't warrant such a harsh reading... I just can't say for sure that they did. Trust me, they accidentally found their way into the pile, and went out in the mail with no one knowing that it had happened.

Not acceptable, certainly, but funny nonetheless.

Literary Agent Web Death

Here's a thought (not a very well-written one), but a thought just the same: "The web has been a great influence of 'disintermediation' in business, by eliminating intermediaries such as booksellers, travel agents and music stores. So, why not literary agents? Unlike the printed book itself, no one would miss them – and without them we might just find that we get to read more of what we want to, rather than what we're told to. "

Down and Dirty in the Delta!

This Delta Review form rejection says: "Thank you for submitting.  Unfortunately, the work you sent us is quite terrible.  Please forgive the form rejection, but it would take too much of my time to tell you exactly how terrible it was.  thanks again for the form letter."  

I am told it is real.  What more need anyone say?