Not
everything we write lands where we hope. I occasionally write essays for themed
calls for submissions, especially for anthologies, and have had some success
(10 thus far). But when the resulting essay is declined, there are decisions to
make. Like every writer, sometimes I am tempted to forget about it.
But not often. Because when I work hard on something, I like to salvage those
efforts.
I
try to remember what I advise my students: that the gift inside rejection (for
something I wrote and submitted exclusively), is that I now have new
material. Even if it requires a little (or maybe more than a little) revision,
I have something to submit elsewhere.
Last
July, I submitted an essay to a planned anthology to mark the 10th
anniversary of the mega-memoir, Eat, Pray
Love in 2016. I learned in November that mine—along with some 1950 other
submissions—was not accepted for what eventually became the book Eat, Pray, Love Made Me Do It.
I
let many months go by, mostly because I was busy with teaching and other
projects, but eventually realized that if I were going to place that essay, it
had to be in 2016.
Fortunately,
the original call had a word limit that coincided with what many mainstream
online destinations look for in personal essay length. So I examined the content, and zeroed in on an angle that I hoped would help it sell: although Elizabeth Gilbert, author of EPL, was in her
thirties when she rebooted her life, my own story of connection with the book
was rooted in midlife, so I enhanced that aspect of the essay. When I sent it
on its way, I aimed at venues with readerships in that age range and that seemed likely to include EPL
fans. I emphasized in my pitch that the globally successful book was
celebrating its 10th anniversary.
That
piece, eventually titled, "Happy
10th Birthday Eat, Pray, Love: A Big Shout-Out to the Book that
Inspired My Three Big Midlife Changes," was published in late August
on Purple Clover, a popular site geared
to midlife women. The site's tagline is: still
crazy after all these years. It seems like a good fit for the piece, the
paycheck is welcome, and I love knowing that my original efforts paid off,
though in a different manner.
Later
this fall, a similar story will play out when a much longer, more literary nonfiction
narrative I originally wrote for Creative
Nonfiction Magazine's 2015 call for works about the weather will be
published by Harpur Palate, another
journal where I'm happy to see my work appear. Lately, I've been seeing a
number of well-written nonfiction pieces about weather popping up in many
quality venues, and I've been secretly wondering if those traveled the same road,
too.
Do
you have pieces that you intended for one place that wound up in another? I'd
love to hear your experiences.
1 comment:
Hi Lisa, thank you so much for this post. I recently learned that a piece I had submitted to Creative Nonfiction Magazine was rejected. Very kind note, but it still was a no. I have been meaning to work on a revision for another magazine and felt like giving up. But now, I am going to focus and finish the revision and send it off. Thank you for the inspiration and encouragement.
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