Transcription
SubmitPublishRepeatHow to Publish Your CreativeWriting in Literary Journalsby Emily HarstoneAuthors Publish Magazine
Copyright 2014 Authors PublishMagazine. All rights reserved.Do not distribute this bookwithout written permission fromthe publisher.Contact:support@authorspublish.com
Introduction.Chapter 1: Why You ShouldSubmit to Literary Journals.15Chapter 2: Five Tips forSubmitting Your Work.23Chapter 3: Print Versus OnlineJournals.39Chapter 4: How to ChooseWhere to Submit Your Work.50Chapter 5: How to Submit YourPoetry for Publication.64
Chapter 6: How to Find LiteraryJournals.72Chapter 7: Are Contests WorthThe Fee?.86Chapter 8: Your PublishingJourney.98
IntroductonIn my experience, one of the best ways tobecome an established author is not bysending out a thousand query letters toagents and independent publishers. Instead,all of my professors in graduate school,famous authors, and poets becameestablished the same way: by publishingtheir work in literary journals.A literary journal is a magazine thatspecializes in publishing work of literarymerit. Some focus on a particular genre, likescience fiction or crime writing, and others
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 7just publish poetry or short stories, or flashfiction. Most are open to work of all kinds.There are well over four thousand literaryjournals that are being published at thistime. Some are printed publications thathave 1-12 issues a year, others areelectronic publications. Many literaryjournals have both print electronic versions.Literary journals are published all aroundthe world. There are respected journalspublished in English and based out of China,Spain, Germany, and almost any othercountry you can think of. Most journals areopen to work by authors of any nationality.
Many literary journals are associated withan academic institution; most universitieshave at least one literary journal theyproduce. Most of these journals are wellrespected. Another quick way to spot arespected journal is to see when it started.Some journals have been around for wellover a hundred years.The majority of literary journals do not paytheir writers. This is because many areregistered as non-profits. It is also becausemost online sites that publish literaryjournals have no ads, and thus no obviousway to raise money. Some journals do pay,usually between 10 and 75 for poems and
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 9short stories. In addition, most printmagazines give you a complimentary copyof the journal your work appears in.In this book I will talk about why you shouldsubmit to literary journals. I will alsoprovide advice on how to find reputablejournals, how to submit to them, and all theother practical details involved insubmitting.I have had my work published in over 50reputable journals, as well as in manyanthologies, some of which you can find atmost major bookstores. My poetry has beentranslated and published in over 10countries. I have also submitted for others
professionally. I have placed many poems inprestigious journals for other people. I havedone all this in the last four years, andbefore that point I had never submitted to aliterary journal.This publication history helped me findpublishers for both my chapbooks. The firstuniversity I was hired to teach at chose toemploy me based on my publication record,as at that point I had no experience teachingat the university level. I also know thatpublishers will consider my manuscriptmore seriously, because many of the poemsmy manuscript contains have been
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 11previously published in established literaryjournals.Submitting and being published by literaryjournals has helped improve my writing lifein so many ways. That is one of the reasons Ialways encourage others to get their workout there.
Chapter 1: Why You ShouldSubmit to Literary JournalsWhen I was first starting out as a writer, Ihad no desire to submit to literary journals.I did not really understand what functionthey served, and I also didn't know howmany there were out there; I just thoughtthey were a small niche marketplace. By thetime I entered graduate school I had beenpublished a few times. Most were injournals where I knew the editor and mywork was solicited from me. This soundsnice and easy, but it is actually less
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 13rewarding if you know the person in chargeof a publication. You always wonder if theychose your work just because they knowyou.When I entered graduate school Idiscovered very quickly why having yourwork published in literary journals wasimportant, regardless of what genre youwrote. It was a stamp of approval, a way ofmaking it clear that you were not a novice. Italso made it easier to publish work in thefuture. The first reason that you should startsubmitting to journals is that agents andpublishers are more likely to sign a contractwith an author who has a track record. I had
written many query letters before I startedsubmitting to journals, and my author’s biowas always depressingly empty. Once Istarted to publish my work in literaryjournals, I started to get the attention ofagents and publishers in a way I hadn'tbefore. Novice writers often complain to meabout the expectations agents andpublishers have for pre-existingpublications. They tell me about howcomplicated it makes getting the first bookpublished. If they started to submit shortstories and excerpts of their novels tojournals for publication, they would have a
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 15solid stepping stone towards getting theirfirst book published.The second reason you should submit tojournals is that it can actually attract agentsto you, or create a direct connection with apublisher. I know several authors who havereceived queries from agents after gettingtheir piece published in a prestigiousjournal. If the journal is well-respected itcan even lead the agent or the publisher toyou. In addition, some journals, like TinHouse and Rust Moth, have a manuscriptpress attached to the journal. Thesemanuscript presses almost always end uppublishing authors whose work has
appeared in their journals first. The thirdreason that you should submit to journals is,as a general rule, the more you arepublished the easier it is to get more workpublished. Now when I submit my work to arespected journal I am no longer a poetwithout publications, but one who hasappeared in many prestigious journals. Idon't know if that alters the editor’sopinion, but it probably encourages them toexamine my work more closely. My workcertainly receives more acceptance andappears in more prestigious journals everyyear.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 17Chapter 2: Five Tips forSubmitng Your WorkIf you have never sent your creative writingout to a literary journal before, theexperience can be intimidating. Manyproductive writers try to avoid submitting;however there is no real way around it ifyou want to get your work out into theworld. The reviews on this website canreally help you know which journals areaccepting now, and how they might interactwith your work. But sometimes a little extrapush is required, having a little more
confidence.Below are three tips forsubmitting your work. Even if you havepreviously sent out work before you maystill find them helpful. I have beensubmitting for four years now. Aftersubmitting for so long, these three tips arestill a touchstone for me. They always helpme keep on track. My first tip is to set asubmission goal for yourself. Set itsomewhere that seems reasonable to you;perhaps five submissions to differentmagazines per month. I often exceed my permonth goal, because once I reach that point,I want the feeling of accomplishment tolinger. Soon those submissions will really
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 19start to add up. The more experience youhave submitting, the faster you get; as youprogress it gets easier. I often have 40submissions out at a time. Three of the mostrespected authors I know suggested thatthis was one of the ways that they becamesuccessful. I don’t know why 40 is the magicnumber, but it seems to be the case.My second tip is to create submissionpackets. If you are a short story writer youdon't need to do this, since most journalsonly consider one short story at a time.However if you are a poet or a flash fictionwriter, journals generally want between 3-5of your poems or flash fiction stories to
consider at a time. I have 5 packets thateach contain between 4-5 poems. I alwaysreserve two packets to submit to places thatdo not accept simultaneous submissions.The rest I submit to multiple places.My third tip is to keep track of what yousubmit and where you submit it to. I keep aWord document that keeps track of whichjournals I have submitted to, what poems Ihave submitted to them, and when Isubmitted these poems. I also write downwhich poems have been accepted andwhere. I also document which journals haverejected certain poems. I update this'submission tracker' every time I submit,
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 21otherwise I might submit the same poemsto the same journal twice, or submit poemsthat have been accepted elsewhere, or anysimilar minor disasters. Make sure youregularly update this document; otherwiseit will get out of control. I have included asample of a very small submission tracker:Sample Submission Tracker:Pending:The New Yorker, Submitted September 28th.What The Living Want (short story)Perception, Submitted September 28th, MyTeeth, Supermax, Pumpkin Bread (poems)Acceptances:
Waterhouse, Submitted Jan 14th, 2013. Ham,Companion, Ursa Minor (poems).Accepted Companions:Block Review, Submitted Jan 25th 2013,Ready (short story).Rejections:Three penny Review, Submitted Jan 7, 2012.Reel (short story).Apple Journal, submitted Jan, 7, 2013.Hopscotch (short story)My fourth tip is to create a couple ofbiographical statements. When you readsubmission guidelines, which vary from site
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 23to site, almost all of them will require thatyou include a brief biographical statementand a cover letter. Most submissionguidelines are very similar, so as long as youhave a biographical statement and a coverletter on a standby it should take you verylittle time to submit.One of your biographical statements shouldbe under 50 words and the other should beunder 100 words in length. Once your workhas been published in various literaryjournals you should include some of themost recent or prestigious journals in yourbiographical statement. However, youshould not include all of them. Below are
examples of biographical statements of lessthan 50 words, one contains journal names,one does not.Sample Bio 1:Maria Smith resides in the rural PacificNorthwest. Her work has appeared oris forthcoming in numerous places,including: Tin House, The Liner, andEcholocation, and the anthology KillerVerse. Her second chapbook Pancakesfor Dinner is forthcoming in 2014 fromHawthorne Press.Sample Bio 2:
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 25Joshua Jones is a poet, editor, andrecovering New Yorker who now livesin Idaho. Joshua once wrote a sonnetevery hour for twenty-four hoursstraight. He loves to hike, cook, andread.My fifth tip is to create a standard cover letterfor all the journals that you are submitting to.A cover letter should be as simple as possible;an editor does not have a lot of time and doesnot want to be bogged down by the details. If Iam submitting to a journal I particularly like, Iwill include a note about why I like it.Sometimes journals will request that I includeadditional information such as titles and word
count in my cover letter and I will cut andpaste that information in. Otherwise my coverletter is almost identical to the sample letter.Sample Cover Letter:Dear Editors,The following poems are for yourconsideration.Thank you for your time,Katharine Hathaway
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 27Chapter 3: Print Versus OnlineJournalsPrint journals have been around for a verylong time; you can submit to journals thatare going into their sixth decade, and havepublished many famous poets, both deadand alive. Online journals are clearly a muchmore recent establishment. Blackbird, oneof the first online literary journals, justcelebrated their 11th anniversary. Thereare advantages and disadvantages that areassociated with both forms of publishing.Below I will offer my personal opinion.
Print JournalsThe advantage to being published in printjournals is that they are generally moreestablished, and they can really help youroverall reputation as a writer. The mostestablished and respected journals are allcurrently in print. Also with printpublication you often you get a freecontributor's copy, so you get to see yourwork in print. Often these print journals arewell bound with a nice cover. If a journal ismade well, receiving it in the mail is athoroughly wonderful experience. It canthen go on a shelf with all your otherprinted work, giving you an occasional ego
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 29boost. Print journals are also more likely topay, although they do this mostly throughfree contributors’ copies or subscriptions tothe journal.The disadvantage to print journals is thatless people read your work. However, this ismore a theory then something I canconcretely prove. Some journals do have avery large circulation and a large group ofconsistent readers, but others do not.People generally seem more open to readingpoems for free online than seeking them outin print or subscribing to journals. All thefeedback I have received from readers that Ididn't know has been regarding poems that
were published online. In addition,sometimes you have to pay in order to reada copy of the print journal that your work isin, and sometimes there is not even adiscount for contributors. I think it is unfairthat the writer should have to pay to seetheir own work in print.Print journals often have slower responsetimes. Sometimes it will take over a year tohear if your work has been accepted orrejected. It can also take up to a year afterthat in order for the journal to be printed.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 31Online JournalsThere are many advantages of onlinejournals. Sometimes they have a largeestablished group of readers who read thejournal regularly. Since nothing tends to behidden behind a pay wall, there are a lot ofgreat poems out there that people canaccess for free. It is also easy to share poemsthat are published online with friends andacquaintances, because you can link to itthrough Facebook, Twitter, or email. Onlinejournals can have audio and visual optionsthat are not as easy for print journals tooffer. They also tend to respond to yoursubmission a lot faster, and often it is posted
online within months. You don't have towait years to see your work out in theworld.Of course publishing in online journals alsohas its disadvantages. Most online journalsare not taken as seriously as print journals,however this is changing. Even within thelast two years, online journals have becomemore respected. This is partially due to thefact that they tend to have a larger and morevocal group of readers. Once a piece isprinted online you have fewer options opento you in terms of getting a journal toreprint it. Also you don't get to feel the joyhaving a journal arrive free in the mail with
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 33your poem in it. Instead, it is a link to yourwork that arrives in your inbox.I have made some pretty general statementshere, because when you go too far into thespecifics there are often exceptions. I havesubmitted my work extensively to bothonline and print journals. For a while lastyear I only submitted to print journals, andhowever rewarding that was, after a while Imissed the accessibility and visibility ofonline publications. So now I am once againsubmitting to both.
Chapter 4: How to ChooseWhere to Submit Your WorkChoosing where to submit is one of thetrickiest propositions as a writer. I knowsome people who submit their work to agreat variety of publications, others whoonly submit to the most prestigious, andsome who only submit to journals they like.Really, where you submit is up to you.However there are good guidelines to keepin mind when submitting. You canpersonalize these as much as you like, andthey change from time to time; mine areconstantly in flux. However most of the time
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 35when I submit, I do so based on one of thefollowing factors:Do They Accept ElectronicSubmissions?I am not much of a letter writer, and I hatedealing with stamps. So I generally justsubmit to journals that accept submissionselectronically. I can be much more efficientthis way, and I can submit to five journals inan hour if I try. I also don’t have to botherwith including self addressed stampedenvelopes (SASE) in order to get feedback.The times I have submitted by mail I noticedseveral differences. Response times seemed
to be much slower: It took most journalsaround six months to send me a response,either by letter or email. In addition, therewere a lot more journals overall that neverresponded at all and just never got back tome about my work, even though I includedan SASE.However the upside to submitting by mail isthat most journals, even establishedrespected journals, which only acceptsubmissions by mail generally have a muchhigher acceptance rate, because fewerpeople submit this way. So that is worthkeeping in mind.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 37Is the Journal Respected?Not all journals have a great reputation.Some journals accept too much work, othersdon’t seem to have any quality control,while others treat their writers poorly, ordon’t try to promote their journals at all.Some just want you to pay for a printedition, and others will reflect badly on youif they appear in your biographicalstatement.The more you submit the easier it will be totell if a journal has a good reputation or not.There are several obvious signs that willhelp you know. The first sign is acceptancerates (more on that later), the second is
reviews, the third is how long it has beenaround, and the forth is word of mouth. Isubmit to many respected journals, but Ialso submit to journals that aren’tparticularly well known. However, I wouldnever submit to a journal with a badreputation.How Much Work Does The JournalAccept?Some journals accept almost everythingthat is submitted to them, while othersaccept less than 1 out of every 100 piecesthey receive.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 39There is a website called Duotrope thatmonitors acceptance rates. They base theseacceptance rates on data that submittersgive them. Most people who use Duotropereport every time a piece of work has beenaccepted or rejected. Because so manythousands of writers use Duotrope theyhave a fair amount of data to work with. Notevery journal has acceptance rates listedthere, but all of the popular ones do.Duotrope used to be a free service, but lastyear they switched to a pay model, so it nowcosts 50 dollars a year or 5 dollars a month.They also have free trial offers. Each week
they feature a market of the week, and thisalways includes acceptance rates.Some journals are notoriously hard to getinto, such as: Tin House, The New Yorker,AGNI, Glimmer Train, The Black WarriorReview, Fence, Gulf Stream, and The ParisReview. Other journals are notoriously easyto get into: Danse Macabre, Writers Haven,Leaves of Ink, Dead Snakes, LinguisticErosion, and The Story Shack. Howevermost journals fall into the middle, acceptingbetween 5% and 30% of the work theyreceive. So keep that in mind whensubmitting.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 41Do You Like The Journal?If you visit the website of an electronicjournal and are overwhelmed by the badgraphics and the clunky interface, don’tsubmit. You don’t want your work to beassociated with something you aestheticallydislike or find frustrating. The same shouldbe true for print journals. Whenever youvisit a website or browse a magazine,evaluate it; not just in terms of visualesthetics but also the writing it contains.You don’t have to like everything a journalpublishes, but you should at least like one ofthe poems, or part of the stories, beforesubmitting. If it’s a print journal and they
require you to buy a copy to read thecontents, then you have fewer options.I often submit to brand new journals, onesthat have never published a single issue, andsome of these journals have beenwonderful. Most of the new journals I havesubmitted to have gone on to have greatreputations. I took a chance on them, but Inever regretted it. Often I will submit tothese journals based entirely on websiteesthetics. This might sound shallow, but sofar it has been a very good strategy.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 43Chapter 5: How to Submit YourPoetry for PublicatonIf you’re ready to get your poetry publishedin literary journals, then you’re going toneed to go through the process ofsubmitting your work. This portion willguide you through the most important stepin the process so that you can startsubmitting your work, and get published.What is that step? Putting together yoursubmission so that it has the best chance ofgetting the editor’s attention, and beaccepted for publication.
When you submit short stories or nonfiction to a journal it can be verystraightforward: You just choose one welledited story that you wrote and submit it.With poetry, things are a little tougherbecause you have to choose 3-5 poems tosubmit. There are several things you have todo before you submit them. The first is thatyou have to choose 3-5 poems that gotogether. Some journals accept 6 and someonly accept 3, but I usually have the packetsinclude between 3-5 poems, because 6 israre and it’s easy to shave a packet of 5poems down to 3 for one journal. I call eachgrouping of 3-5 poems a “submission
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 45packet.” I usually have between 5-7submission packets at one time, and eachpacket contains 3-5 poems. I submit each ofthese packets to more than one place at atime, but usually to no more than four. Thatway if the poems get accepted anywhere Ican easily withdraw them fromconsideration at the other publications.When choosing what poems to place inwhat packet, I consider the tone. Forexample, say I have a number of darklycomic poems, so I may group these togetherin a packet. However there should bevariation in each packet. Don’t make themistake of having poems that all have the
same tone, theme, and subject matter. Theeditor who reads these poems only gets oneimpression of your work, and if it doesn’tmatch with what they are looking for, toobad for you. Having variation in your packetsignificantly increases the likelihood of theeditor connecting with one of your poems.Still, think about order and sense ofnarration as well; one poem should notcontradict or clash with the next. After youhave chosen this group of poems, go overthem one last time, reviewing for anyobvious mistakes or changes in spacingduring the rearranging process. Some poetsoften have an urge to over explain the
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 47context of their poems in the cover letterwhen they submit their work to a journal.Restrain yourself from doing that. Mosteditors won’t publish work unless thecontext is made clear within the poemsthemselves.Once you have your submission packetsready, your poems should be ready tosubmit to any journal! Restrain yourselffrom editing the packets for every journal,just make sure that the way your poems areformatted to fit the journals’ guidelines.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 49Chapter 6: How to Find LiteraryJournalsSo now that you know a little more aboutsubmitting, you’re probably curious aboutwhere to find listings of literary journals.There are a lot of literary journal listings outthere, and some are better than others.Authors Publish does not have a formal listof journals at this point, but we review up tofive literary journals a week. In our longerreviews we include submission guidelinedetails, acceptance rates, and paymentinformation; we are very thorough.
The four biggest listing services all havepros and cons, but all are worth using.Below I review all three.Duotrope:www.duotrope.comDuotrope lists almost all the journals outthere that are open to free submissions.They also list journals that involve a fee, butthey are always careful to make note of that.To find journals on Duotrope you can signup for their weekly market update, which isan email that informs you of what journalshave opened and which ones have closed.You can also use their search engine and
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 51their statistics page for more detailedinformation. There are many ways to findnew markets on DuotropeIn my opinion their statistics page is themost helpful. On this page they list thejournals that have the highest and lowestacceptance rates. They also list the journalsthat are slowest to respond and those thatare quickest. These are all helpful statisticsto know. If a journal takes more than a yearon average to respond, I won’t submit tothem. If a journal accepts over 20% of whatis submitted to them, I will not send themmy work.
Duotrope is a wealth of information; youcan monitor the journals you submit tothere, and you can use their handysubmission tracker to keep track of whereyou have submitted your work. Duotropealso provides interviews with thepublishers, informs you on how much theypay, and provides various other kinds ofinformation.Unfortunately, about a year ago Duotropestarted charging 5 dollars a month to usemost of its services. You can browse a scaledback version of the site without paying, butto see the truly useful information you haveto be a subscriber. Previously, Duotrope had
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 53been free for years; however they oftenoffer free trials and discounts which areworth looking into. They post such offers ontheir website as well as their Facebookpage. I pay the 5 dollars a month and neverfeel any regret about it, but honestly itdepends how much you end up submitting.Poets & Writershttp://www.pw.org/literary magazinesPoets & Writers is a magazine that also hasa website filled with resources. All theirresources are free and easy to use. In myexperience, the most helpful resource theyprovide is their literary magazine listing
services. They do not list as many journalsas Duotrope, and most of the journals theylist are based out of the United States.However they still list over 2,000 journals.You can look through the listingsalphabetically by title or you can applysearch filters. When they list the magazine,they list what kind of creative writing theyaccept, if they accept simultaneoussubmissions, and if they accept electronicsubmissions. They also tell you if they pay,even if it is only a contributor copy. Theyalso list the dates the journal is open tosubmissions as well as if it is an electronicor print journal.
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 55This is a lot of helpful information, but thereis nothing about response times oracceptance statistics. You still have to visitthe literary journals’ individual websites tofind out the details of their submissionguidelines. Poets & Writers also does notupdate their website as frequently asDuotrope, so some of their information isout of date.The Review Reviewhttp://www.thereviewreview.net/The Review Review is a review of literaryjournals. They write up thoughtful in-depthreviews of literary journals but they also
have a simpler, to the point listing of literaryjournals.The Review Review doesn’t have nearly asmany journals on their site as the otherservices I mention, but the information theydo have is easy to navigate and wellorganized. You can look at it alphabeticallyor by using a search tool. You can only lookat paying markets if you like.The New plete.htm
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 57The New Pages provides writers with anumber of services, and they also postexcellent detailed reviews of journals.However their services are disorganized, soI am always reluctant to recommend thissite as it is difficult to navigate.Their listing service is as minimalistic as itcomes; they only list all the journals with alink to their website and a list of the genresthey publish. This website does not specifyif journals are a print journal, or if they pay,or anything like that. All the more thoroughreviews of the journal are elsewhere on thesite, and you have to search to find them.
Chapter 7: Are Contests WorthThe Fee?As an author, editor, professional submitter,and poet, I end up talking about contests agreat deal. A lot of writers enter contests,but as a general rule we do not reviewcontests on Authors Publish. This is becausethere is an entry fee attached to contests.The first time I ever encountered a contest Iwas not entering it; instead I was an internfor a small press. This event took place anumber of years ago, and this press is not
Authors PublishSubmit, Publish, Repeat 59longer in business. My job as an unpaidintern was to read approximately 400manuscripts. I had a little over two monthsto reduce these 400 manuscripts to 10. Iwas the only one to read these 400manuscripts, even though on the officialcontest outlines (for which each person hadto pay a considerable fee) it said that eachmanuscript would be reviewed by a g
Mar 03, 2014 · Authors Publish Submit, Publish, Repeat 7 just publish poetry or short stories, or flash fiction. Most are open to work of all kinds. There are well over four thousand literary journals that are being published at this time. Some are printed publications that have 1-12 issues
