Life in the trenches of literature...

[felis_ultharus]

Well, I got my second rejection letter yesterday. It came with commentary, so I suppose that's progress.

I didn't expect to be published in The Antigonish Review on first try. It's the most prestiguous short-story magazine the country has. But I think I was hoping.

They felt that the short format didn't do the story justice. But since they have a 3000-word cap, it wouldn't have been published at all if I'd increased the length. These tiny caps on short-story length are absurd, and are a massive constraint on the kinds of stories a writer can tell.

On that note, I sent my glorified haiku -- I contend 1200 words cannot be considered a short story -- to the Quebec Writers' Federation yesterday. So we'll see about that.

In other news, I've done 20 English-as-a-second-language placement interviews in the last two days, mostly with businesspeople and the odd pharmaceutical lab tech. The funniest response I've received so far is "His friends will not come in his house next Sunday."

Too bad for them.

Comments

[seal7.livejournal.com]

Tsk, honestly. We learned in sixth grade, prior to any sex ed, that 'come in' with a noun attached means to have an orgasm.
*nods*
Strange they don't tell everyone...

;P

That they won't print a story they feel is butchered in short format kinda speaks for them, though...
Good luck with the haiku, tho :/

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

Thanks :)

As for "to come in", we get preposition errors a lot, and people usually don't know what they're saying.

The weird thing is, we get the same errors in English at the same companies, over and over again. There seems to be an office Français/Frenglish that passes for a real language, and becomes a habit.

[jc2004.livejournal.com]

I hate word caps on stories. That's why I couldn't be bothered submitting anything for the longest time. Everything I write comes out novels and novellas. 3000 words is a brief article, not a story, unless it's a story for a very small child..

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

I can manage 3000 words. It`s things like barely-over-1000 I can`t stand. It always feels like we`re being squeezed down for some efficiency expert`s recommendations -- that art is being sacrificed for abstract theories of management that stick a number on to everything.

That happens everywhere in society. It shouldn`t have to happen in literary magazines. One good 3000-word story should be accepted in place of three poor 1000-word ones, if that`s how it turns out. Capping everyone makes no sense.

[montrealais.livejournal.com]

"Please ask for the key to the driver." -- seen today on the bus from Lisbon