I don't think editors hold any personal malice against writers, at least not as a general thing. However, a lot of the hoops set up in the submission process are designed as a deliberate attempt to prevent submissions. They're designed "with malice aforethought" as our legal friends would say. Editors aren't malicious, but the system they designed is.
I think I said that editors tell us we shouldn't take rejections personally, but that editors also shouldn't take it personally when we writers complain bitterly about it. Recognizing that our anger can't really be directed against them personally in a system which they themselves set up to be as impersonal as possible. Let's have a little balance here. If we aren't to take things personally, neither should they.
I don't think I said anything about how editors should handle rejections in a more humane manner. But if you asked me for some specific suggestions, I might say:
1. If you're going to lie, don't make it a stupid lie. Don't get my novel back to me in four days (using regular post, no less, not overnight) and claim you rejected it after a thorough review.
2. On the other hand, basic professionalism should encourage you to handle submissions in under a year. Two and a half years, including losing the entire manuscript once, deserves an apology letter. Even if I am just a writer. You don't have to buy it, but you should handle things in a professional manner, and if you screw up you should admit it.
3. Keep it short. If you're going to buy it, send a check. If you aren't, just say something like "Sorry to disappoint you, but our company has decided not to buy this." If you feel compelled to discourse upon how bad the writing is, do so in sufficient detail that the writer can gain some useful information from your critique. If instead you feel tempted to write a half-line blast about how bad it is, one with no useful information.. shut the hell up.
4. And for gods'sakes, do NOT say "It just didn't catch my attention." You say you don't want this rejection taken personally, but you have just told the writer that you, and only you, are the problem. You've made it nothing BUT personal.
As for people who claim to like rejections.. I msyelf got one I liked. It was full of useful information on how to improve things and what markets might suit me better. The editor went far beyond the call of duty. I was immensely grateful, and I wrote a nice letter saying so.
But that's not what most people I've heard seemed to mean when they said they like rejections. They just said they like them, and that's as far as they took it. I think they're afraid of the Great Editor's Cabal (taht doesn't exist). Or they're trying to be professional in the only way they know how. They're trying to be ingratiating, as you say, or they're just saying it because it's something pro writers say, so they feel they have to say it themselves.
Or they're trying to keep up their spirits, whistling as they walk through the graveyard.
Regardless, though, saying you like a rejection, however personal and useful it might be, is at its best trying to make the best of a heartbreak. I say again that, considered as an issue all by itself, if writers did in fact like rejections, they wouldn't do everything in their power to avoid getting them.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2004-03-09 05:30 am (UTC)I think I said that editors tell us we shouldn't take rejections personally, but that editors also shouldn't take it personally when we writers complain bitterly about it. Recognizing that our anger can't really be directed against them personally in a system which they themselves set up to be as impersonal as possible. Let's have a little balance here. If we aren't to take things personally, neither should they.
I don't think I said anything about how editors should handle rejections in a more humane manner. But if you asked me for some specific suggestions, I might say:
1. If you're going to lie, don't make it a stupid lie. Don't get my novel back to me in four days (using regular post, no less, not overnight) and claim you rejected it after a thorough review.
2. On the other hand, basic professionalism should encourage you to handle submissions in under a year. Two and a half years, including losing the entire manuscript once, deserves an apology letter. Even if I am just a writer. You don't have to buy it, but you should handle things in a professional manner, and if you screw up you should admit it.
3. Keep it short. If you're going to buy it, send a check. If you aren't, just say something like "Sorry to disappoint you, but our company has decided not to buy this." If you feel compelled to discourse upon how bad the writing is, do so in sufficient detail that the writer can gain some useful information from your critique. If instead you feel tempted to write a half-line blast about how bad it is, one with no useful information.. shut the hell up.
4. And for gods'sakes, do NOT say "It just didn't catch my attention." You say you don't want this rejection taken personally, but you have just told the writer that you, and only you, are the problem. You've made it nothing BUT personal.
As for people who claim to like rejections.. I msyelf got one I liked. It was full of useful information on how to improve things and what markets might suit me better. The editor went far beyond the call of duty. I was immensely grateful, and I wrote a nice letter saying so.
But that's not what most people I've heard seemed to mean when they said they like rejections. They just said they like them, and that's as far as they took it. I think they're afraid of the Great Editor's Cabal (taht doesn't exist). Or they're trying to be professional in the only way they know how. They're trying to be ingratiating, as you say, or they're just saying it because it's something pro writers say, so they feel they have to say it themselves.
Or they're trying to keep up their spirits, whistling as they walk through the graveyard.
Regardless, though, saying you like a rejection, however personal and useful it might be, is at its best trying to make the best of a heartbreak. I say again that, considered as an issue all by itself, if writers did in fact like rejections, they wouldn't do everything in their power to avoid getting them.