Writing To Be Read

When I first began writing, way back when the dinosaurs still roamed the earth and there was no such thing as Internet, I entered a poetry contest that was advertised in my local paper.  Not long after, I received a letter stating that my poem had been chosen to be included in their anthology.  I was elated.  One of the first poems that I ever submitted was going to be published.  Soon after, I began getting mailings offering to let me purchase the anthology with my poem in it.  I was new to this writing stuff, but I had thought that publishers would at least give you a free copy, especially when there was no monetary compensation.  Guess again.  Over the next year, I received numerous mailings offering to let me buy a plaque with my poem on it,  bookmarks featuring my poem, even refrigerator magnets featuring my poem.  One mailing informed me that my poem had been chosen to be read by me at their annual conference, all at my own expense, of course.  I didn’t have much luck back then in getting my writing published, although I did manage to have one poem accepted and even made a whole five dollars off of it.  I put my pen and pad away, deciding that I would never be a published writer, and went on to pursue other ventures.  

Several years later, I got my first computer with Internet, and somewhere down the road, I decided to give writing another shot.  Before I had actually made that decision though, I received an e-mail advertisement from a company with a familiar name, requesting that I submit a poem to their online poetry contest.  It was the same company that wanted to publish my poem in their anthology, oh, so many years ago.  (I don’t know if they actually did publish my poem, because I had not purchased their anthology, and apparently, that was the only way that I could find out.)  They were looking for poems with Halloween themes, although I think the advertisement came in March or April.  I was already onto their game, but I figured, what the heck.  I sat down and quickly jotted down a poem about Halloween and submitted it, just for laughs.  (I included this poem in my blog post, Can You Feel It?, as an example of a poem that was not very good, if you care to read it.) 

I soon discovered that not much had changed since the Internet came on the scene, as my e-mailbox quickly filled up with offers to purchase anthologies, plaques and every other kind of gimmick they could think of to get money out of me.  What had changed with the Internet was the information that I had access to and I soon learned that this company and others like it were called vanity presses, because they played on the author’s vanity to get the author’s money.  I also learned that they would publish just about anything that was submitted, whether it was of good quality writing or not, so acceptance by them meant very little.  The Wikipedia definition of a vanity press is:

            “According to the US National Endowment for the Arts, “For the purposes of this           

            category, a vanity press is defined as one that does any of the following: requires individual

            writers to pay for part or all of the publication costs; asks writers to buy or sell copies of the

            publication; publishes the work of anyone who subscribes to the publication or joins the

            organization through membership fees; publishes the work of anyone who buys an

            advertisement in the publication; publishes work without competitive selection; or publishes

            work without professional editing.”^[3] 

            A vanity press will generally agree to print and bind any author’s work if the author is willing

            to pay for the service; these fees typically form a vanity press’s profits.”

Many vanity presses will publish books for you, too, at the author’s expense, of course.  Now don’t get me wrong.  There is nothing wrong with self publishing, if that is the route that you choose to go, but I’d rather go with a publishing house that will tell me straight what needs to be changed to make my work better, so that I can make it the best that it can be.  Vanity presses are not very selective and nor are they very critical.  You won’t get honest feedback from them.  They will tell you that your writing is good, even if it stinks, because they just want your money.  Although I do enjoy writing and receive great pleasure from producing work of good quality that I can be proud of, it is for that very reason that I want to earn money from my labors.  I want to make a living doing something that I can enjoy.  Is that so much to ask? Well, maybe, but the point here is that the idea is to make money, not to spend it.  I don’t think that I am alone in being an author on a limited budget.  If you can afford to self publish, that is great, and I hope that you find a really great publisher that will honestly help you to make your work shine.  My problem with vanity presses is that they try snow you, and that, in my opinion, makes them a big group of professional scam artists.

I went on with life, ignoring their e-mails, for the most part, and I made the decision to give my writing career one more shot after I discovered how many avenues were available via cyberspace, and how much easier access to them had become.  Then one day, I noticed that I had several e-mails from my vanity press and it made me curious as to what they were trying to sell me now.  So, I opened the first one, which had been sent earlier that morning.  It said that my poem, the same one that had been accepted months ago, was not good enough to make the cut and requesting that I submit another poem instead.  I was flabbergasted!  I knew the poem wasn’t good, but I also knew that these people accepted just about everything sent to them and this poem had previously been accepted, so I didn’t understand what was going on.  I then opened the next e-mail from them, which had been sent that afternoon.  It stated that my poem, (the same poem they had already accepted and now, rejected), had been selected to be featured on their home page, indicating that this selection was quite an honor.  That was it.  I wrote and submitted the following poem, just to see if they would really accept anything submitted:

The Scam 

9:30 am I get a rejection from poetry.com

Woe is me, I want my Mom.

I’ll tell you though why I had to smile.

All I had to do was wait awhile.

10:30 am poetry.com sent another e-mail

About the very same poem, without fail.

Another rejection? Oh, no. This time

A spot on the home page could be mine.

The first message wants me to submit a new poem

I’ll sit down right now and e-mail it from home.

They didn’t understand my poem last time.

They suggest that I write something that rhymes.

Now my poem is great, they’ve got something to sell

So they think that my poem is really swell

I’m glad that they want my poem in their book

But for my money, I will not be took.

Copyright ©2009  Kaye Lynne Booth 

 I disproved the theory that they would publish anything with this poem, because they never even sent me one response regarding it.  What a surprise!  Soon thereafter, I unsubscribed from their mailing list and we parted company for good.  I had known the poem wasn’t good to begin with.  After all, I just thought it up in about 15 minutes.  I never even revised it.  I guess it’s a good thing that I am not vain about my work. 

Trackback URI | Comments RSS