Tag: iota

Are anonymous submissions a good thing?

Masks

I came across this article recently, in Anon magazine, setting out the opinions of three writers as to whether anonymous submissions to magazines were a good idea.

I rather like Kathleen Jamie‘s conclusion, that actually by creating a so-called ‘level playing field’ for all poets, regardless of reputation, a magazine like Anon (championing the cause of anonymous submissions) is perpetuating the mistaken idea that there is some sort of conspiracy among well-known poets to keep everyone else out. She suggests the problem is not that the pages of poetry magazines are dominated by the same few names, far from it. But rather this:

No editor fears receiving a sub-standard poem by Seamus Heaney, if such a thing exists. What he fears, understandably, is receiving shed-loads of dreadful half-baked so-called ‘poetry’ accompanied by pages of testimonials, CVs and special pleading.

In other words, an anonymous submissions process doesn’t make it any easier to get poems accepted. If they’re mediocre, that’s the end of it. And big-name poets don’t submit to small magazines anyway. They don’t need to.

Plus, as Gerry Cambridge points out in the same article,

Unpublished poets are deluded if they believe they can’t get published because they’re not known names. After all, those known names were once unknowns, too.

and

… any editor of an individual cast of mind would like nothing more than to print the work of an unknown or little-known poet whose writing, in the editor’s opinion, is excellent – or even promising and individual in a way that marks it out from the majority

Anon isn’t the only magazine with an anonymous submissions process – South also insists on anonymity, as does Iota. Having had work in both, I’ve always wondered if I’ve been a beneficiary of the process. Then again I’ve also wondered if having an androgynous name also works in my favour. We can speculate on all these things and more, I suppose. (And to be honest I quite enjoy it – I find the intrigue, arguments and gossip an essential and entertaining part of the poetry scene – but then again I’m only really an amateur onlooker, so I can see how easy it is for me to say that, and how frustrating it is for others who hate the shenanigans and just want to get on with their writing.)

What do you think? Do aspiring/nascent writers benefit from anonymous submissions? Or is it insulting to editors to assume they are swayed by who the poet is rather than the quality of the individual poems?

 

Image credit: South Peace News

Hurrah! The Rialto takes another

Rialto

So excited to have had a poem accepted for The Rialto.

The first poem I had published was in this magazine (Rialto 70, Autumn 2010) and to say that I was ‘gobsmacked’ would be an understatement… only I’m not allowed to use that word in my husband’s presence as he believes it is an affront the English language.

The only trouble is … I wasn’t as proud of that particular poem as some of the stuff I’ve written more recently, plus since then I’ve had this nagging feeling it was a fluke, and I needed dear Michael Mackmin to say ‘YAY’ to another in order to revive that ever-ready to deflate tent that is my confidence.

So – phew! Very happy.

Also forthcoming are 3 poems in Iota, although I’m not sure when it’s coming out. Back in March I got a rejection from Iota, for the same three poems that had previously been accepted by the same. Very strange – eventually I realised it was because I had submitted twice – the first time I included my contact details on the poems and then realised that Iota operates an anonymous selection process. I was advised to re-submit, and it was the second submission that was rejected. 

It’s a good example of how the same poems can be wrong for a publication one week, and right for it the next – presumably down to things like what other poems are in the mix already, where the editor has a gap, etc. Maybe also what they read that morning or had for lunch. Who knows – but it was a good illustration of how you should not give up too easily on a poem just because it gets rejected a few times.