Literary Clusterfucks 2013

and since we're sortof on the topic, this investigative piece is a great if harrowing read

https://gal-dem.com/transphobia-sexual-violence-sound-like-a-man-hang-up-vawg-investigation/

Pretty good account of something that should not have been published.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/aug/09/kate-clanchy-book-updated-racial-stereotypes-picador-some-kids-i-taught

practically and realistically very few UK publishers actually now stump up the cash for the dedicated layer of editorial staff competent to tackle these kinds of issues in advance a manuscript will be read by

i: lawyers but they're not looking out for this kind of thing
ii: half-read by the commissioning or a copy editor lightly advising on structure or argument and such (but judging by heavyweight books that make it out into the wild, these levels of reading are often barely adequate and often miss basic sentence repetitions, let alone anything subtle ("subtle")
iii: a proofing editor if the publisher is flush with cash lol

it's rare for books even to be fact-checked (or i suppose i shd say the onus is placed entirely on the author and the publisher is largely the conduit -- and such oversight as there is comes from staffers quite low in the foodchain and often simply without the authority to say "this passage is very dodgy and must be rewritten"

“She later claimed the quotes were “all made up”” sounds like she didn’t read her own book either

For which I do not blame her as it sounds awful

had a racist intern write it

lol imagine the gall "this thing that you're saying I wrote, that is in my award-winning book? you're making it up."

like how fucking thick and racist is this woman.

the examples in this paragraph escalate quickly

In particular, readers criticised the inclusion of racial stereotypes such as “almond-shaped eyes” and “chocolate-coloured skin”, and references to one student as “African Jonathon” and another being “so small and square and Afghan with his big nose and premature moustache”.

had a racist intern write it

you laugh but this seriously could have been what happened.

Danielle Rose lost her job as Poetry Editor over this tweet. Complete BS. Totally outrageous. pic.twitter.com/GlncJ9Jtqy

— Forrest Cardamenis (@FCardamenis) September 5, 2021

imagine being a literary editor and thinking that a tweet is a good place to express that idea

It's at least half true, but it was the wrong half for the poetry editor of a magazine to attach to herself in public. I can see why he managing editor would be livid about it.

she could have written, like, an essay or something.

Yes, exactly, a little more room for nuance.

seems like her point has been made

she's rolling with it and is either happy or has convinced herself that she is, same thing imo, everybody gets to be as mad as they want & she gets to feel like she provoked some discussion. everybody wins

seems like her point has been made

when you're done being the poetry editor of barren magazine

One of the reasons the literary scene is so bad is bcz most ppl in it think it's a conversation with each other. They don't believe this is for anyone outside of it.

She will be replaced with someone who believes the same thing as her.

tfw when you get sacked for misaligned vision

Jumping off the Barren Mag gravy train, how will she recoup those millions?

https://themillions.com/

Why would you name your literary magazine that.

of course Big Poetry is shutting down one of its best voices

Loool.

No one knows who she is, btw, and her CV is full of crap publications. I also read some of her work— not too remarkable.

No one knows who she is, btw

Of course not; she's a poet! (rimshot)

I meant within poetry. (BTW, I harbor no illusions about poetry's audience, and find this whole maelstrom that she started rather tiresome. I've won awards for my poetry— the only people who care are people who already care).

Why would you name your literary magazine that.

I'm surprised at the reaction here. To me, what she said is basically true and p much benign. She wasn't saying poetry shouldn't try to reach beyond its insular world, she was merely saying that the poetry world is insular.

what she said is basically true and p much benign.

I agree 100%. The only thing that makes this different from you or I or almost anyone else in the world saying the very same thing is that she worked for a literary magazine as its poetry editor. Declaring to the world that the very section of the magazine you are charged with overseeing is irrelevant to any of its readers who are not poets is a good way to tell most of its subscribers they are wasting part of their money. Literary magazines struggle hard enough to stay afloat already.

god forbid magazine editors tell the truth

She shouldn't have been sacked for it. That world is too far gone for it to matter.

Start a petition!

Write a letter to the editor!

Whole thing is unpleasant for various reasons.

if she hadn't have been sacked, would we even be posting about this? I hadn't heard of her or this magazine before this, and I am somewhat familiar with "the scene". Compared to the previous thread topics of racism and transphobia, pointing out that contemporary poetry is pretty cloistered is whatever

Relatedly -- whatever happened with the SPD clusterfuck?

Well some have accused her of racism and the people who sacked her of transphobia

Declaring to the world that the very section of the magazine you are charged with overseeing is irrelevant to any of its readers who are not poets is a good way to tell most of its subscribers they are wasting part of their money.

I don't think I know a single living poet (under or over 60) that doesn't critique the poetry world with the implication "we should do better" tbh

emily & sarahell otm, all the Marge Simpson “it’s true but she shouldn’t say it” reactions are weird as hell

Yeah

Being poetry editor of a literary magazine is also a pretty strong indication of her commitment to the enterprise, which I'd think entitles her to express some pessimism about its significance.

I don't spend time in that teapot, so its tempests do not disturb my calloused heart.

I think standard operating procedure around is to state that anyone who becomes a victim of Twitter basically deserved it, and even if they didn’t who cares

Re your question about SPD, Sarahell:

The original complainant was joined by another. At the same time, a fake "Poets Union" formed and tried to start a boycott of SPD and some of the presses it distributes. The remaining workers there didn't call for this boycott, the Poets Union persisted, there was an impasse, things died down except in the world of the original complainant, who seems to be a grievance machine tbqh.

Basically, there was a huge shitstorm in...April or May. The original complainant totally showed that their intention was to try to destroy SPD rather than reform it, and most people in the literary world said, "nope, and no to this weird cadre of shitty leftist poets, too."

feel like the first few replies itt by call all destroyer, xyzz, james, joan chachi, table, aimless are a sadly generic example of the reflexive impulse to justify ppl getting canned due to twitter flameouts. ‘she should have written it in an essay’, ‘her poetry/the magazine is bad anyway’, ‘she’s wrong to acknowledge that only poets read poetry because poetry shouldn’t be a conversation(?).’ the proper reaction to this is ‘lol a substantial fraction of poets are properly deluded about the size of the reading audience.’ the replies to her tweet are an incredible and hilarious display of how out of touch poetry ppl are—one person said “poetry is actually really popular if you count slam”. this is like if wolf eyes got dropped from their label for saying ‘not many ppl listen to noize tapes’

emily & wins otm