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CNF Places to Submit & Contests - Summer 2012

Guys. I’ve been ridiculous about not submitting my own work to journals, so I’m putting this here to remind myself (and remind you, if you’re interested):

  1. Prairie Schooner’s CNF Contest - May 2-August 31; the entry fee is $5; the prize is $250 and publication in Prairie Schooner’s Spring 2013 issue
  2. Creative Nonfiction’s Southern Sin Issue - deadline is July 31; the reading fee alone is $20, but for $25 you can pay your reading fee and get a four-issue subscription; accepted essays will be published in CNF #47; CNF and Oxford will be awarding $5,000 for best essay

I’m probably not going to get accepted by any of these places, but I’m going to start submitting. This is a life goal. I’ll be updating this list accordingly.

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Someday I am going to write an essay about you, and I am not going to change your name.

Hannah, Girls — Episode 105 (via annaetc)

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It is an observable fact that most people don’t like themselves, in spite of being, for the most part, decent enough human beings—certainly not war criminals—and in spite of the many self-help books urging us to befriend and think positively about ourselves. Why this self-dislike should be so prevalent is a matter that would require the best sociological and psychoanalytical minds to elucidate; all I can say, from my vantage point as a teacher and anthropologist of the personal essay, is that an odor of self-disgust mars many performances in this genre and keeps many would-be practitioners from developing into full-fledged professionals. They exhibit a form of stuttering, of never being able to get past the initial, superficial self-presentation and diving into the wreck of one’s personality with gusto.

Phillip Lopate, “Writing Personal Essays: On the Necessity of Turning Oneself Into a Character”

Do you think this is true, that we don’t like ourselves? I can say for absolute certainty that I have felt this way for most of my life. But I’m working on it. Are all of you the same?

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Carl H. Klaus and Ned Stuckey-French’s Essayists on the Essay and Brian Doyle’s The Wet Engine came in the mail today. My little creative-nonfiction-loving heart is squealing.

…And despite everything else I should be reading instead, I started Cheryl Strayed’s WILD today. I’m pretty damn excited.

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“You know,” someone says, “I heard Tommy Lee’s dick is so big Pamela Anderson Lee can sign her whole name on it.” “You know,” he says, “I let a girl sign my dick once. Do you want to?” —— This is just one part of an essay I’m working on about being a “Good Girl.” I gotta give mad props to Motley Crue for playing on VH1 at just the right time (“Dr. Feelgood” at that). And mad props for the idiot boy who asked me that question, because he’ll be in my manuscript/thesis, his words saved for posterity. In other words: Publish me when I get done with this essay/manuscript. You won’t regret it.

“You know,” someone says, “I heard Tommy Lee’s dick is so big Pamela Anderson Lee can sign her whole name on it.”

“You know,” he says, “I let a girl sign my dick once. Do you want to?”

——

This is just one part of an essay I’m working on about being a “Good Girl.” I gotta give mad props to Motley Crue for playing on VH1 at just the right time (“Dr. Feelgood” at that). And mad props for the idiot boy who asked me that question, because he’ll be in my manuscript/thesis, his words saved for posterity.

In other words: Publish me when I get done with this essay/manuscript. You won’t regret it.

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Progression of a CNF Thesis

  • Early: Essays about mother and father. Confusion. Blame.
  • Middle: Essays about mother and father. Anger. Intense anger.
  • Late: Essays about mother and father. Acceptance. Tenderness.

It could be that I’m confusing therapy with writing CNF, but then again, I write how I feel. And I’ve been through enough therapy to accept that my feelings have and needed to change.

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Tonight was my first “real” submission as a serious writer. To Brevity. My friend Janet had to hold my hand. Let’s hope submitting this essay somehow makes everything about this past weekend better—even though Janet keeps reminding me to expect 20 rejections before I get an acceptance. Otherwise, I’m still on a wave of terrible feelings. I really need some validation as a writer. Or something good to happen.

Tonight was my first “real” submission as a serious writer. To Brevity. My friend Janet had to hold my hand. Let’s hope submitting this essay somehow makes everything about this past weekend better—even though Janet keeps reminding me to expect 20 rejections before I get an acceptance. Otherwise, I’m still on a wave of terrible feelings.

I really need some validation as a writer. Or something good to happen.

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Bark: Ten Reasons Not to Sleep with an Essayist

My favorite is this one, but I am writing about my father. I am working through both trauma and a book.

6. She will continually write about her mother or her days as an addict or some ethereal night in a place you do not know. You will think that she’s working through a trauma; she will say, no, she’s working on a book.

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Mlle Hazelwood

Reader & Writer, Master of Fine Arts, Collaborator on Structure and Style, a new poetry blog.

 

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