Welcome to our weekend conversation!
I’ve gotten a handful of questions recently. Typically I try to bunch reader questions together into an overall theme, as many small questions often fall under one large category—unfair contracts or delayed publishing schedules or what have you.
I can’t quite see a connection among these readers’ questions, though, other than the fact that clear answers do not seem to readily exist. So I’ll handle them one by one. Maybe they are questions you’ve had too at some point. Maybe this will help you in the future. Perhaps you have particular knowledge or experience with these, in which case your input will be especially appreciated.
Let’s dive in.
P. writes,
My question: one of my poems was accepted in a gallery show that featured poems along side paintings (lovely, honored). Is this considered publishing? There were no written copies printed. Journals are so particular about wanting unpublished work.
Wow, a doozy right out of the gate!
This is a very good question. Many writers are confused about this because confusing information is circulating. In Poetry FAQs: When is something considered published?, Writer’s Digest Senior Editor Robert Lee Brewer argues that writers should always check the magazine’s site and follow their guidelines, as editors have different policies in this regard.
Many editors consider anything published anywhere at any time under any circumstances as published. This can even include public readings. And if a publication specifies what they consider published in their guidelines, it would behoove a poet (or any writer really) to respect the editor’s considerations.
With such editors, a poem posted anywhere counts as publication, whether it's posted in a public forum or blog, or even a private, password-protected location online.
Brewer is right that some editors have an extremely broad view of “previously published.” However, are such editors right to include public readings or work displayed in a gallery published?
Actually, no, they’re not. Editors really should not extend the definition of “previously published” in this way. It’s not fair and it is not accurate to claim work read or displayed publicly is published.
The U.S. Copyright office breaks this down more definitively and is a good resource for writers with these sorts of questions. They say (emphasis my own):
“Publication” is the distribution of copies or phonorecords of a work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending. The offering to distribute copies or phonorecords to a group of persons for purposes of further distribution, public performance, or public display, constitutes publication. A public performance or display of a work does not of itself constitute publication.
In other words, copies must be made available to an audience in order to constitute publication. If, say, the gallery printed a catalog with one’s poems in it, that would be published. But performing or displaying the work is not publication.
The Copyright Office clarifies,
To perform or display a work “publicly” means—
(1) to perform or display it at a place open to the public or at any place where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered; or
(2) to transmit or otherwise communicate a performance or display of the work to a place specified by clause (1) or to the public, by means of any device or process, whether the members of the public capable of receiving the performance or display receive it in the same place or in separate places and at the same time or at different times.
So then, if you’d had your work displayed in a gallery or similar, should you mention that in your cover letter? I think it’s up to you.
If you do mention it, I would say something like, These poems were part of an art exhibit but have not been published. Make it clear that though they’ve appeared publicly, they have not been officially published.
Or, don’t mention it at all. Save it for your bio when the poems get accepted. I don’t think it will tip the scales one way or another in regard to consideration of your work. Remember that many editors don’t even bother reading cover letters until they’re interested in the work itself.
Long story short, if the works have been displayed somewhere and you’d like to submit them to a journal, you’re good, you’re fine, you’re perfectly splendid. Go on and send them out, baby!
K. writes,
We all know the tradeoffs between online only litmags and paper only litmags, ie, if the online mag folds your work is gone, and when the paper litmag comes out only your audience is limited to only those 24 people who get the magazine and actually read your piece. On my website publication page I’m listing the publication in Paper Litmag X alongside a link to a page I’ve created myself that contains the text of the piece. So in effect I’m publishing the story myself at the same time that Paper Litmag X is. Am I running afoul of publication rights I’ve assigned to Paper Litmag X (standard first North American Serial Rights and non-exclusive reprint rights)?
Another great question, and I appreciate the concern K. is showing here for fairness flowing back toward the lit mags. Some writers would just say, it’s my work, I’ll do what I want, and not think twice about it. Given how precarious publishing is, and given how little to nothing writers get paid, such a view is arguably justified.
But, it’s always good to be cautious, considerate, and copyright-centric.
So, let’s break this all down in terms of what kinds of publishing scenarios you may encounter, as not all lit mags approach acceptance and publication the same way.
Some lit mags provide no contract at all. The email acceptance of the work and your reply—Woo hoo! Thank you! I’m over the moon!—is basically considered the contract. The exchange is an informal handshake, the work goes onto the site or into the magazine, and that’s that.
In this case, you can assume that rights revert to you after publication. You have loaned the journal a temporary license to publish the work. But unless it’s stated otherwise, ownership immediately returns to you, the author. At that point you can do whatever you please with the work. Though it’s both courteous and legally sound to credit the original publication in any future reprints.
If there is a contract, it will typically say something like, Magazine acquires First North American rights, or some such. All rights revert to the author immediately or after ninety days or after one year, three years, etc. Be sure to read this part of the contact and make sure you are okay with these terms. If you agree to those terms, then you must abide by them before re-posting anything on your site. Again, if and when you do re-post (or reprint in a collection, anthology, etc.) be sure to credit the original publication.
A third and rarer contract clause is a lit mag that wants exclusive rights to your work in perpetuity. This is not common, but it is something to look for in a contract because it’s not completely unheard of. Typically, if a lit mag wants this right, they pay the author. (They’d better pay the author for this!)
With any contract that has stricter terms such as rights in perpetuity or exclusive rights for a certain period, always be sure to check what you’re getting for that. Will they be reprinting the work in their own anthology? Posting it on social media? Sharing it on a podcast? If they are continuing to sell the work in other formats, will you receive a profit from those additional sales? The answer to all of these questions may be yes or no; different lit mags do different things.
Whatever the answers are, be sure they are terms you are okay with.
Now, I’ve strayed some from K.’s basic question. Short answer: Yes, if the rights of the work swing back your way, go on and hit that work out of the park.
(Huh? A mangled metaphor but I think you know what I mean!)
Anonymous writes,
Was wondering if you could do a post about magazines and journals that solicit work from writers. Ploughshares, who is open about their guest edited issues containing 50/50 solicited versus submitted work, has a new issue out edited by [Poet]. The professional ties between [Poet] are hard not to notice when names begin to be searched together. The poems are pretty uninteresting on the whole, though this is a subjective judgement. My question: are editor-solicited magazines/journals just an opportunity for the editor to pay professional favors to their colleagues? As an outsider, that’s the way it seems…
Another great question.
To which I say: Yes and no. No and yes. Sometimes, yes. Mostly no. But also: yes.
I address some of these concerns in Why do lit mags bring on Guest Editors? and also Is lit mag publishing fair?
Here’s the thing: Lit mags bring on guest editors for all kinds of reasons. They want to expand the reach of their magazine. They want to shake things up with a different perspective. A literary journal might bring on a sci-fi or horror writer to guest-edit an issue just for a refreshing change from their usual offerings. They might bring on a guest editor with ties to a specific region or certain writing communities.
Such a writer will naturally have a professional network of writers to tap into. That is the point. The magazine wants that guest editor to reach out to all the sci-fi or horror or Kansas-City-based or French-speaking writers in their network, in order to bring fresh voices to the magazine.
This is not necessarily a bad thing. It allows the magazine to expand its horizons. It shows a hunger to grow on the magazine’s part. If executed well, it also shows some humility from the editors. They’re basically saying, Hey, we know literally no French-speaking horror writers in Kansas City. We’d like to hear more from that population. Let’s bring on someone who can help.
Now, is that guest editor paying “professional favors” to those solicited writers? God, I hope not. That would certainly lend to a feeling of slimy backdoor deals and, worse, extremely mediocre writing getting past the gates. I have not read this issue of Ploughshares, and I’m not a great judge of poetry generally. So I can’t speak to this writer’s response to the poetry here.
I will say, look. Let’s be honest. We know these things happen. We know that having connections can grease the wheels in the literary world. I’ve seen it happen on many occasions. I’ve seen it happen at Ploughshares, where the guest editor just happened to be very close friends with one of the issue’s contributors. I’ve seen it happen at other magazines.
But I also know for a fact that these magazines do read from the pool of general submissions. And, since we are focused on Ploughshares, I know that a reader shared right here in the Lit Mag Brag column not too long ago that their story was selected by one of that magazine’s guest editors straight from the slush pile. I’ve heard this from other writers about this particular journal.
So, if I’m being totally real, here is what I think happens: A guest editor is brought on to a magazine. This guest editor reaches out to their professional network and says, Hey! Guess what! I’m editing a guest issue of this amazing magazine! Send me your work please! This is precisely what the guest editor is brought on to do.
That guest editor then receives work directly or passed along to them from people they know. Do they consider it more carefully? Are they more willing to work with those writers on revisions? Probably. But again, this is not necessarily a terrible thing. This is the way the magazine gets that broader network of writers it seeks.
Might the guest editor send a few extra emails to close friends? Hi, have you published that essay from workshop yet? If not, I’d love to consider it for this issue I’m editing! Yes, this likely happens too.
Is this guest editor paying “professional favors”? I don’t know. This is hard to define in the literary world, where the boundaries between professional relationships and friendships and networking and socializing and doing a favor for someone versus genuinely supporting someone’s career are all extremely blurry.
Perhaps this is a topic for another post. I do find this one of the most delightful and also baffling and at times challenging aspects of building a literary career. Are we friends? Are we colleagues? Should we shout and scream about all our feelings and post personal photos on social media? Or is that like airing your dirty laundry at the office water cooler? Are your workshop pals your best friends? Are we all best friends but also rungs on one another’s respective ladders upward?
It’s complicated. It’s messy. Yes, I think I need to explore this in a separate post.
For now, I’ll say, try not to let the messiness and complicatedness and injustice bog you down. I encounter mediocre works in lit mags all the time. Who knows why they’re there or how such space came to be given to such works? We will never know.
Ignore it. It’s not your problem. Focus on what you can control and do your genuine, honest best. Walk with the virtues you wish to see upheld in this community, and in yourself.
Find the lit mags where they publish work you actually like. Find editors you admire and trust. Submit to those journals. Recognize that if a magazine has a guest editor for an issue, yes, this will limit the pool for general submissions.
If this magazine charges a fee, consider whether it is worth it to submit, given the odds. You might also find it objectionable that a magazine charges a fee to some writers while letting others presumably pass directly to the editor without paying. This is a fair criticism. This happens at some magazines whether they have a guest editor or not. I’m not a fan of this practice. Most writers aren’t fans of this practice.
What are our options then? You could avoid magazines that charge fees altogether, which many do, and is completely valid. Or you could submit to these magazines anyway, hoping they’ll find you in the general submissions pool. And they very well might. I know plenty of writers who’ve gotten work accepted in just this way. It happens. It really does.
The choices here are personal ones, all depending on your personal aspirations, value system, financial budget and professional goals. But what you shouldn’t do, under any circumstance, is let yourself get bogged down with cynicism. I’ve been there. It’s not an especially fruitful state of mind.
The beauty of the world of lit mags is that there are just so many magazines. Try not to focus on the ones that frustrate you or lower your morale. Thousands of editors are out there, eager to find new voices, sincerely reading the work that comes in, and working daily to put together stellar compilations of writing.
Keep submitting. Keep sending your work to competitive, top-tier magazines if you think it’s ready. Keep exploring, growing and moving forward. Trust that the process does work, even if you have to navigate in and around some thorny bits.
Don’t let suspicion and distrust corrupt your open, yearning writer’s heart. It can. It really can. And when that happens, it’s a loss for us all.
Now that I think about it, these questions do fall under a large umbrella. And that umbrella is Fairness. What’s fair? What’s fair to writers? What’s fair to editors?
Hopefully with more information and understanding, this umbrella will protect us all from the downpour!
Tell me what you think.
Have you encountered magazines that say work shared at a public reading is “previously published”?
Have you reprinted work you’ve had in a lit mag on your own personal site?
What do you make of lit mags where guest editors solicit work? Does this discourage you from submitting? Does it feel fair? If you are an editor or have guest edited a lit mag, what’s your take here?
Have you gotten bogged down in a cynical submissions mindset? How have you gotten out of it?
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