More Thoughts on Rejection and Mediation

When Nate Fisher first shared his thoughts about editorial rejection with me (a version of which I posted yesterday), I told him I thought the issue was both simpler and more problematic. But I also thought that his perception of the need for mediation was humane and idealistic. In a way, it reaches back toward dreams of a philosopher-king, in this case a literary decision maker who always, and always for the right reasons, places the long-term best interests of the stumbling, burgeoning poet at the heart of his rulings.

This idealism isn't misplaced, though its reality is rare, especially in the world of literary journals. In my own experience, such a connection is more likely to exist in one-to-one mentor-student relationships, in which students willingly concede a certain portion of their iconoclastic pride because they must trust that their chosen teacher will light them at least a few steps into the forest of thorns. But for the most part, journal editors don't have the luxury of such concentration. Every year an editor must read thousands upon thousands of submissions; and in order to accomplish that task she has to narrow her focus, conscript her time, scan rapidly, rely on first impressions, react swiftly to missteps or bagginess or punctuational tics or generalizations or repetitions, and so on and so on. Any sense of mediating between the writer's hopes and the magazine's requirements is subsumed in a torrent of what can become cynicism or desperation but is often simply weariness.

Beyond this conundrum, there's another question. Does the submitting writer want to think of the editor as a mediator? After reading Nate's post, a novelist friend sent me the following comment:

I guess I am old-fashioned enough to believe that pain is good. That rejection leads to self-examination. That even hatred (engendered by being turned down) forces one to see, however unpleasantly, just who and what one is. The aim is not pleasure. The aim is to produce something that exists, in the face of all that--despite glitz and ephemeral approval--does not. When I actually sell something, I don't feel I have pleased the editor. I feel I have rammed it down his throat or shoved it up his ass. It is a losing battle, with temporary, pyrrhic victories. That's what makes it interesting. That's what makes it a life. . . . I realize this is not the attitude you can bring to, say, the Frost Conference, but don't you think a complete denial of the dark side of the creative process risks great losses?

He's right; I know he's right, and moreover, I know, when Nate reads this, he'll agree. We're all three of us, even in the midst of our humanity, misanthropes and isolates. I haven't come across many serious writers who aren't--including Robert Frost, whose rude and cranky spirit is a constant reminder that both/and is where it's at. As writers, we can be humane while reveling in misanthropy, and don't imagine that we shy away from that truth at the teaching conference. As a matter of fact, we work hard to demonstrate that poetry isn't necessarily therapy or pleasure or fun--that engagement with a work of literature is crucial precisely because it takes us to that both/and place--where, say, hate and love or anger and joy can and must exist in tandem.

But getting to that place takes time. It also takes daring. Journal editors, in a perfect world, would have both, but in truth few of them do. What most have are deadlines and preconceptions that they often mistake for daring. There's not much room for mediation in that mix.

Should there be? I'm just not sure.