Rejection Slip

[Lightning Rod]

I guess it all started when I got the rejection slip a couple of days ago from a syndicate to which I had submitted my column. The editor was very kind and said he personally enjoyed my work but it wasn't what they were looking for yadda yadda yadda.

I'm pretty thick skinned. I can handle criticism, argument, insult and even downright abuse with equanimity, but I don't do rejection well.

I've discovered over the years that playing golf with the publisher goes a lot further toward selling your work than scrupulously following the formal submission guidelines. But still rejection tears me up. I begin by questioning my own worth, which is an old trick that artists use to solicit praise, but it starts out honestly enough.

Inevitably I get to the "I'm never going to write again" stage, usually roughly coinciding with the time that I resort to volatile spirits. Drunkenness and self-pity work so well together. By the time my words become slurred I can tell you in no uncertain terms why Poe had rejection slips papering his walls and why Whitman couldn't quit his day-job.

By morning rejection is the least of my problems. I have to write with this headache.

[Zlatko Waterman]

Dear LR:


Take some more aspirin and read these:

http://users.erols.com/veritas/CR.HTM


Then read this opening paragraph about Jerzy Kosinski's novel, "Steps":

http://www.brothersjudd.com/index.cfm/f ... /Steps.htm


Rejections? GRRRRRRR . . .I got a million of them.

Your brother in rejection,


Zlatko

[Lightning Rod]

I think you've hit on something here Z-ko

I'm going to submit my manuscripts under the name

of Ann Coulter and see if that works.

[Zlatko Waterman]

. . .or Anne Rice . . . (?)

Just be sure to get a set of fangs in each one . . .

"The Poet's Fangs" (?)



--z

[PoeticEyeGuy]

LR,

As you know we (my wife is a literary agent and I help out when I can) deal with rejection on a daily basis -- both as rejectors and rejectees. It is such a subjective business and it is a business. So sometimes rejection has nothing to do with writing ability. Of course there are many folks writing who don't have a given talent for it. But if it helps them get through life then that is a good thing for them. You on the other hand have a great talent for writing and if you aren't picked up by the normal publishing channels it is probably a testament to how good you are rather than the other way around.

Perry