Rejection Rocks!

Rejection update

I received the rejection letter for another piece submitted to the campus publication. I’m really starting to get a kick out of this. If you’ve read the blog long, you know that the first piece, Shut Up was rejected for being too complex. They wanted to publish an all stripped down version, but I rejected that. A few days later, I got a formal rejection letter with the closing comment: “We hope you find a home for the essay.”

Of course it has a home. Right here. Bought and paid for. Rejection with actual “reasons” is a new experience for me. When photographic submissions are rejected, they seldom if ever contain “constructive criticism.” This constructive criticism stuff is kind of fun: I’m too complex? Thank you!

The letter today, for the piece Stuffed in a Box read, in part:

You write “Stuffed in a Box” in a way that suggests it is a memory, making your recount ring with an element of truth. The disjointed and unpredictable detail echoes that found in memories recounted everyday. You offer an original style in recounting your experience in this manner.

I suspect the reader hasn’t read many modern novels, if they think that this is the case.

Although this freshness is a major strength of the piece, it can sometimes confuse your readers. Keep the style, but try sharpening the details that keep the storyline intact, such as the introduction of new characters and explanation of their relationships to the narrator.

Narrator? This is a non-fiction piece. There is no “narrator,” only me. Real life can be confusing? Oh well. The follow-up suggestions really are the icing on the cake, especially in light of any postmodern notions of how texts really work. Great stories are built on aporia. It’s the difference between writing for children, and writing for adults. What fun would it be if I took their suggestions?

• Eliminate some of the “blank spots” in the story. Sprinkle the narrative with some transitional statements of reflection as the narrator takes the reader from era to era of this experience.



• At one point, the piece is a music review. Try to avoid veering away from the personal and exploratory tone of the piece that remains consistent up to this point.

Era to era? The events described take place over about two months. “Transitional statements of reflection?” Don’t you mean judgment? Fuck that. I occasionally write such things, but I do my best to remove them from pieces where I would prefer that a reader make up their own mind about the “moral” of the tale. Of course the essay contains the elements of a “music review.” I knew the man strictly as a musician, and it is impossible to discuss his attitude as a person, without discussing his music.

Sorry for the rant, but I actually feel really good about this reaction. Some people just don’t get it. I can now add to my gold medal in complexity, the added plus of a blue ribbon in confusion.

Thank you very much, you’ve been a lovely audience.

Next year, if I write something really challenging, I’ll have to submit it just to read the rejection letter! As far as I’m concerned, these essays are just bush-league when compared to real literature. Dumb them down further? Sorry, I prefer to head the other way, not into incomprehensibility, but instead, into richness. The best things in life are difficult, and while I don’t want to become impenetrable, I would prefer to have substance. I didn’t think I was submitting to a newspaper, aiming for sixth-grade writing. As an adult, I prefer not to have my food chewed for me. I like to think that people who care to read what I write would feel the same.