Excellent Rejections & the Problem of Figuring Out What It Is So You Can Send It Out

Like most, I have carefully scanned rejections to determine the degree of rejection--not noticing at the time how absurd (and pathetic) that is.  For example, is it absolute? Say you sent it out and they rejected it a week or so later.  That looks pretty absolute.

Keeping it several months looks better.  However, keeping it several months might have only meant they were busy and didn't read it for two months, at which point they shuddered in disgust and sent it back immediately, making it absolute after all.

Or is there some sign that you might want to try them again?  There might be but it is complicated by the fact that these things are all forms and a blanket encouragement "to see more of your work in the future" is not much encouragement.  Better than nothing maybe but not much better.

Now and then there's a real response with an editor's name on it indicating there was one that came close and they are eager to see more.  I am always pleased by one of those.  This is also absurd because, in my experience, what normally happens then is that I send more and they are promptly given an absolute rejection.  As if to say...what's this crap?  We didn't ask for this!

Excellent Rejections

Anyway, for anyone who might be as absurd as I am, and I hope that's a small number, I wanted to mention some excellent rejections I've had lately, just because anybody taking the trouble to pull as much sting out of them as they can deserves some thanks.

This one -- from Eleven Eleven Journal, California College of the Arts -- is clearly a form rejection but I have to say I have rarely had a gentler one or or one that left less of a sting.

We sincerely appreciate your interest in publishing with Eleven Eleven, we swear we really do. Unfortunately we are unable to print your work at this time. Please do not let this letter or any other rejection letter deter you from writing. We're writers too and our inboxes are filled to the brim with these sorts of letters. We print them out and use the backs for scrap paper. Thanks again for your consideration. We look forward to reading more of your work.

Warmly,
Eleven Eleven Staff
http://elevenelevenjournal.com/

This one -- from the editor of the Apple Valley Review -- is clearly not a form rejection.  Instead, it gives the sense that the pieces were carefully read.  In some ways, though it may seem crazy to say so, it's as good as a publication.  I have had publications where I was never sure if the editors liked the piece or not and if so why.

Dear Robert,

Thank you for your recent submission to the Apple Valley Review. I'm sorry to let you know that your poems--"Crime & Punishment," "I saw a doe slip into brush this morning, 3 am," "Is," and "The Urge (Post-Op III)"--and stories-- "How She Came and Went" and "Break Time, 3rd Shift"--were not accepted for publication.

However, this is a particularly subjective business, and I always appreciate the opportunity to read new work. Please feel free to submit again in the future.  (If it's helpful to know, "Crime & Punishment" and "Break Time" were my favorites of this set.  I like your use of language--e.g., the spoon, "a local landmark."  Also, please don't worry about any cutting/pasting formatting problems.  They're common and don't usually cause me any trouble.)

Thanks again for thinking of us.

Best wishes,

http://www.applevalleyreview.com/

Figuring out what it is

And adding to the problems involved in sending things out is the question of what the thing is you're sending out.  This can be tricky with so many places using Submittable and having boxes that separate one genre from another.  

For example, this thing, called "The Over and Over Again: Two Figures" which just came online at Work Literary magazine. http://www.workliterarymagazine.com/submission/robert-gregory-1192015/

Is it a short story?  Not exactly but maybe.  Some might disagree because although it shows people at particular instants in their lives, it doesn't involve them with each other within the narrative.  It suggests a link between them based on their experience of having worked a long time and invites speculation about how they respond to that experience.

Is it an essay?  Putting the two narratives together suggests an essay approach, as if they are illustrative.  But nothing spells out what they might be illustrative of.  It's all narrative aside from the two characters being linked by being in the same text.

I finally decided to call it a narrative essay.  Those can tend to be personal essays or memoirs but this one isn't.  But I left it at that for now.  It was clear the editors enjoyed the piece and that wiped out a lot of rejections and left me eager to write more stuff and get more rejections, some of them excellent I hope and many of them not.  Hope I can remember the words to "I will survive" in case I need to sing it to the cat.  She hates it when I forget the words.