Dead on with this piece. After 40 years of rejection slips, I write on, boat against the current of an indifferent publishing world. If I stopped to figure the monetary losses involved in my passion, I would only get depressed, so I don't bother. It's not about money anyway. It's about pursuing a passion, a dream. Writing is like eating for me--I have to do it to stay alive. The joy is in the pursuit, and I have to trust that I'm getting better at my craft. Best wishes to everyone else on this boat with me. https://www.peaceableman.com/post/four-reasons-to-keep-your-dreams-alive-and-they-have-nothing-to-do-with-money
I dislike "for the love" publications on principle because if you can't afford to pay your writers, you shouldn't be running a magazine. It might be your passion, but it runs mostly on the (unpaid) passion of writers. I really dislike non-paying publications that require reading fees. I've been a professional writer for 35 years, and this kind of financial abuse is appalling.
If I'm going to be paying a reading fee, the publication had better be one I want to brag about being in.
I am also an academic and a creative writer, and I know just what A. Louise Cole is talking about! I would add a couple of things. I find it unprofessional, discourteous, dismissive, and even suspect (as in, did anyone even READ the piece I sent!?) when the boilerplate rejection notice does not address me by name and/or title, nor is it signed with anyone's name. The failure of appropriate address is a matter of respect. The failure of appropriate signature is a matter of evading responsibility or accountability. Much of this is now handled through online submission software, but it can be set to allow for such courtesies. And (pandemic delays or unforeseen exigencies to one side), the management of a literary journal ought to be accountable to a definite timetable: 6 months at the most, to reply to a submission. (Poems and short stories are not academic research, which takes more time to read and evaluate. As Cole notes, creative writing is a much more subjective matter, and can be done more quickly.) If literary journals are receiving more submissions than they can responsibly process, they should cap the number of submissions and close when the cap is reached, making sure that each person submitting receives a timely, personalized response. By "personalized," I mean, at least acknowledging the name of the person, the title of their work, and perhaps a couple of sentences (even if boilerplate) that indicate the reason for rejection, if not a more thoughtful reading of the work. This system is broken!
While you make good points, I’d like to counter that the economy is different in academia. By way of example, my sister is a full professor at a university and she does these laborious unpaid peer journal reviews as a duty to her profession. She also gets paid close to $200k a year by her university. In addition to peer reviews for publishers, she edits peer journals, labor that counts toward her teaching load. In contrast, I run small literary magazine for which I work, unpaid, for as much as 30 hours a week (sometimes less of course.) I do all the admin, web design, and serve as chief editor. All of the editors are volunteers. For the first seven years I supplemented the magazine’s budget with my personal funds (i.e., paying costs for hosting, etc.) Now the magazine is self-supporting, but the projects we developed to support taken even more of my time. I am doing all of the work as a volunteer. That’s why we charge a nominal submission fee. If the magazine were supported by a university (or if we were being compensated for all of our labor) it would be a different situation.
I’m also a writer who pays submission fees to magazines. Before I had the experience I now have as an editor I might have felt differently about paying fees.
I've been following my "vow" since we last discussed the financial issues, and have probably saved a week's worth of grocery money (these days, not just pennies). I am only submitting to fee-free lit mags, and though I believe my work is stronger than ever, have received more rejections in the past 5 months than ever—maybe I'm submitting more, not sure (and don't want to take the time to study my submittable page). But I am not deterred. I'm done paying.
There seems to be circulating in the ether about rejections. This has become my writers' group #1 preoccupation at the moment, and despite the fact I've had some work published I've stopped submitting to paying mags or comps after so many rejections. I simply can't afford to thrown good money after bad. My Substack tackled this just last week (excuse the shameless self-promotion but I'm trying to build my readership) https://abbys.substack.com/p/thoughts-on-writing-4
I couldn't agree more. I'm also an academic, and everything you've written is also true in the sciences. (I am professor emeritus at UC Berkeley in Bioengineering.) As a retiree, I'm still writing, albeit creative works (poetry, essays, memoir, fiction), instead of grant proposals and scientific papers. My experience with litmags mirrors yours. I'm certainly not making any money at this. Fortunately, that doesn't matter at this point; I'm in a financial position to afford this expensive hobby.
But what impact does this kind of financial structure have on new writers, and in consequence on literature? Few can afford this approach (of submitting to many small presses) and will fall away. The end result will be a much less interesting world, literarily.
We are so used to "free" internet services that we forget that in analogue days, writers had to pay postage, printing costs, and with their time to submit writing to journals. Also, since there were no simultaneous submissions or on-line journals, there were fewer opportunities to send work in.
That writer you mention who submitted her or his work 75 times could not have conceivably done that "back in the day." There were likely not 75 outlets for the work AND it would have taken dozens of years - with turnaround time often being four to six months.
So here we are, reaping the convenience and opportunity of the internet and widespread opportunities for public electronic and print curation and not taking into account that it has costs that someone must bear.
As Louise points out, this IS fraught and gives writers with more means a leg up in the shear numbers of submissions that can afford. But I suspect this has always been the case — that most writers have negative "returns" on their work.
******(I'd be interested for those who were active back in the pre-internet days to respond to this to confirm or deny my thesis here.)
I don't mind not being paid for short stories, in general. Nice when it happens, of course.
I don't submit to fee-charging mags, or most competitions, anymore. They make it plain in their subs guidelines that they are biased in certain directions, so it's just not worth it if the prospective writer or their work are not in the favoured groups. I don't actually care so much about that, as of course they are entitled to publish what they want, and these days there are hundreds of magazines out there that I can submit to. I'll probably never read any of them if they are THAT biased. I think it's not great for literature in general, though, if their only readers are going to be people who are biased in the same way.
I also don't mind critiques by magazines' readers, in theory, but I have never paid for one and am never going to. Most of those I have been given have been from people whose only qualification to critique seems to be that they attended some writers' course and stuck to the 5 narrow rules they learned there, and have been more or less worthless... except to teach me the valuable lesson of never going for the paid critique option.
'Please, sir, take my turnips and sell them in your shop.'
'Sorry, no-one buys turnips these days.'
'But they're good for you. And besides, I can't help growing turnips.'
'Tell you what I'll do. If you show me a good enough turnip, and pay me to put it in my shop, I'll tell everyone that comes to my shop that this fine turnip was grown by you.'
'So, when you sell it, I'll get some of the money?'
'Sir, I told you, no-one buys turnips these days.'
Great article Louise! Welcome to my world and it is not an easy one. With so many lit magazines publishing “only the best of the best of the very best”, it is almost impossible for anyone to make living today as a writer, let alone get published. I think it helps to establish some personal rules for submissions (ex. simultaneous submissions, checking magazines acceptance rates, no more than two rejections per magazine, etc.). And I like your suggestions. too Good luck to you.
Dear A. Louise Cole, we really must keep in touch. I love the lucid tone of your essay and concur with all of it. For my part, I keep spreadsheets on all my translation and original writing submissions and there is a column for cost. I feel compelled to keep data on the submissions process for the sake of my mental health, yes, but also to have an objective cost-gain analysis available to me. This becomes important at the moment of querying a book of short stories in translation to a publisher, for example: I want to be able to know (perhaps to say), it cost me this much money to promote this author. I wish I had been keeping track of how much TIME I have spent, too! Especially in the literary translation field, that hidden expense is off the charts.
Dead on with this piece. After 40 years of rejection slips, I write on, boat against the current of an indifferent publishing world. If I stopped to figure the monetary losses involved in my passion, I would only get depressed, so I don't bother. It's not about money anyway. It's about pursuing a passion, a dream. Writing is like eating for me--I have to do it to stay alive. The joy is in the pursuit, and I have to trust that I'm getting better at my craft. Best wishes to everyone else on this boat with me. https://www.peaceableman.com/post/four-reasons-to-keep-your-dreams-alive-and-they-have-nothing-to-do-with-money
I dislike "for the love" publications on principle because if you can't afford to pay your writers, you shouldn't be running a magazine. It might be your passion, but it runs mostly on the (unpaid) passion of writers. I really dislike non-paying publications that require reading fees. I've been a professional writer for 35 years, and this kind of financial abuse is appalling.
If I'm going to be paying a reading fee, the publication had better be one I want to brag about being in.
I am also an academic and a creative writer, and I know just what A. Louise Cole is talking about! I would add a couple of things. I find it unprofessional, discourteous, dismissive, and even suspect (as in, did anyone even READ the piece I sent!?) when the boilerplate rejection notice does not address me by name and/or title, nor is it signed with anyone's name. The failure of appropriate address is a matter of respect. The failure of appropriate signature is a matter of evading responsibility or accountability. Much of this is now handled through online submission software, but it can be set to allow for such courtesies. And (pandemic delays or unforeseen exigencies to one side), the management of a literary journal ought to be accountable to a definite timetable: 6 months at the most, to reply to a submission. (Poems and short stories are not academic research, which takes more time to read and evaluate. As Cole notes, creative writing is a much more subjective matter, and can be done more quickly.) If literary journals are receiving more submissions than they can responsibly process, they should cap the number of submissions and close when the cap is reached, making sure that each person submitting receives a timely, personalized response. By "personalized," I mean, at least acknowledging the name of the person, the title of their work, and perhaps a couple of sentences (even if boilerplate) that indicate the reason for rejection, if not a more thoughtful reading of the work. This system is broken!
While you make good points, I’d like to counter that the economy is different in academia. By way of example, my sister is a full professor at a university and she does these laborious unpaid peer journal reviews as a duty to her profession. She also gets paid close to $200k a year by her university. In addition to peer reviews for publishers, she edits peer journals, labor that counts toward her teaching load. In contrast, I run small literary magazine for which I work, unpaid, for as much as 30 hours a week (sometimes less of course.) I do all the admin, web design, and serve as chief editor. All of the editors are volunteers. For the first seven years I supplemented the magazine’s budget with my personal funds (i.e., paying costs for hosting, etc.) Now the magazine is self-supporting, but the projects we developed to support taken even more of my time. I am doing all of the work as a volunteer. That’s why we charge a nominal submission fee. If the magazine were supported by a university (or if we were being compensated for all of our labor) it would be a different situation.
I’m also a writer who pays submission fees to magazines. Before I had the experience I now have as an editor I might have felt differently about paying fees.
I've been following my "vow" since we last discussed the financial issues, and have probably saved a week's worth of grocery money (these days, not just pennies). I am only submitting to fee-free lit mags, and though I believe my work is stronger than ever, have received more rejections in the past 5 months than ever—maybe I'm submitting more, not sure (and don't want to take the time to study my submittable page). But I am not deterred. I'm done paying.
The timing of this article couldn't have been more perfect. Your insight and comments, to me, were spot on. Thank you for sharing.
There seems to be circulating in the ether about rejections. This has become my writers' group #1 preoccupation at the moment, and despite the fact I've had some work published I've stopped submitting to paying mags or comps after so many rejections. I simply can't afford to thrown good money after bad. My Substack tackled this just last week (excuse the shameless self-promotion but I'm trying to build my readership) https://abbys.substack.com/p/thoughts-on-writing-4
I couldn't agree more. I'm also an academic, and everything you've written is also true in the sciences. (I am professor emeritus at UC Berkeley in Bioengineering.) As a retiree, I'm still writing, albeit creative works (poetry, essays, memoir, fiction), instead of grant proposals and scientific papers. My experience with litmags mirrors yours. I'm certainly not making any money at this. Fortunately, that doesn't matter at this point; I'm in a financial position to afford this expensive hobby.
But what impact does this kind of financial structure have on new writers, and in consequence on literature? Few can afford this approach (of submitting to many small presses) and will fall away. The end result will be a much less interesting world, literarily.
Much that you're written here resonates. I hope that you've (perhaps?) noted Becky's links over time to my own Substack newsletter (which you can also find through my profile here), which curates fee-free calls and competitions that *also* pay for winning/published work. I've also shared some similar observations in this piece: https://www.awpwriter.org/magazine_media/writers_notebook_view/61/making_poetry_pay_five_ways_to_increase_your_poetry_income.
We are so used to "free" internet services that we forget that in analogue days, writers had to pay postage, printing costs, and with their time to submit writing to journals. Also, since there were no simultaneous submissions or on-line journals, there were fewer opportunities to send work in.
That writer you mention who submitted her or his work 75 times could not have conceivably done that "back in the day." There were likely not 75 outlets for the work AND it would have taken dozens of years - with turnaround time often being four to six months.
So here we are, reaping the convenience and opportunity of the internet and widespread opportunities for public electronic and print curation and not taking into account that it has costs that someone must bear.
As Louise points out, this IS fraught and gives writers with more means a leg up in the shear numbers of submissions that can afford. But I suspect this has always been the case — that most writers have negative "returns" on their work.
******(I'd be interested for those who were active back in the pre-internet days to respond to this to confirm or deny my thesis here.)
I don't mind not being paid for short stories, in general. Nice when it happens, of course.
I don't submit to fee-charging mags, or most competitions, anymore. They make it plain in their subs guidelines that they are biased in certain directions, so it's just not worth it if the prospective writer or their work are not in the favoured groups. I don't actually care so much about that, as of course they are entitled to publish what they want, and these days there are hundreds of magazines out there that I can submit to. I'll probably never read any of them if they are THAT biased. I think it's not great for literature in general, though, if their only readers are going to be people who are biased in the same way.
I also don't mind critiques by magazines' readers, in theory, but I have never paid for one and am never going to. Most of those I have been given have been from people whose only qualification to critique seems to be that they attended some writers' course and stuck to the 5 narrow rules they learned there, and have been more or less worthless... except to teach me the valuable lesson of never going for the paid critique option.
Brava
'Please, sir, take my turnips and sell them in your shop.'
'Sorry, no-one buys turnips these days.'
'But they're good for you. And besides, I can't help growing turnips.'
'Tell you what I'll do. If you show me a good enough turnip, and pay me to put it in my shop, I'll tell everyone that comes to my shop that this fine turnip was grown by you.'
'So, when you sell it, I'll get some of the money?'
'Sir, I told you, no-one buys turnips these days.'
thank you for your honesty and reflection.
Great article Louise! Welcome to my world and it is not an easy one. With so many lit magazines publishing “only the best of the best of the very best”, it is almost impossible for anyone to make living today as a writer, let alone get published. I think it helps to establish some personal rules for submissions (ex. simultaneous submissions, checking magazines acceptance rates, no more than two rejections per magazine, etc.). And I like your suggestions. too Good luck to you.
Dear A. Louise Cole, we really must keep in touch. I love the lucid tone of your essay and concur with all of it. For my part, I keep spreadsheets on all my translation and original writing submissions and there is a column for cost. I feel compelled to keep data on the submissions process for the sake of my mental health, yes, but also to have an objective cost-gain analysis available to me. This becomes important at the moment of querying a book of short stories in translation to a publisher, for example: I want to be able to know (perhaps to say), it cost me this much money to promote this author. I wish I had been keeping track of how much TIME I have spent, too! Especially in the literary translation field, that hidden expense is off the charts.