December 31st, 2019 - FTNY, Year Deuce in Review
Dear TNY,
Hey bud. Once again I’m back for a year in review. Two whole fucking years of reviewing. Whoa. 98 stories read in total; 49 read in 2019. And I gotta say…
Wait, I’m gonna get to the metrics. But I wanted to discuss something that happened to me this year with regard to these letters and I think it’s important. Late summer 2019, I was contacted by a literary magazine about printing some of my letters from FTNY (I won’t use any names here and I have permission from the editor of the magazine to proceed with this story). The editor was enthusiastic about FTNY’s product and seemed to really understand the purpose of these letters. This individual selected a handful of past letters, including their “artwork” (I laughed loudly at the usage of the word artwork because they are just doodles that entertain me; hell, this whole endeavor is my entertainment because you never write back or change your practices), and submitted them to the editorial team of the magazine. The team had a look and felt that, yes, the material was abrasive, but something could be salvaged. Then there was this assistant editor that flat out disagreed with everything I said in one review. The primary editor thought it would be humorous to look at literary critiquing via side-by-side, my letter next to the assistant editor’s response to my letter. I thought that could be interesting too, but I was hesitant to participate without approval of the overall piece. Not because I’m afraid of looking like a demonic, enraged, turbo fuckstick (I mean, I publish these letters to the world and some people, like the assistant editor, DO NOT find them funny and come the conclusion that I’m all the bad things). What I was worried about was a one-sided attack instead of two sides presenting cogent arguments. Now, is it hypocritical of me to concern myself with such things while simultaneously publishing these letters to the world every week? Possibly, but that’s because you motherfuckers don’t write back. You’re not interested in a discussion about literature because you believe that you are right (evidence based conclusion). I believe that I have a lot to learn about everything, always. And, as ol’ F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” That’s how I try to approach my interactions with you. But when you don’t respond, well...I assume if you, TNY, could argue in favor of any of your pieces, you would. But you seem to be unable to make said argument, so here I sit, wondering how any of you achieved actual paying jobs selecting and editing short fiction for a magazine when the vast majority of non-New York readers (that I talk to, which is a small sample size, I admit) have stopped reading your magazine because of the quality. Or, like myself, they rage weekly. They just don’t tell you about it. Except my buddy, Ben. He slings shit your way from time to time with massive edits, like a boss. You also ignore him. That tower must be nice. You can’t even hear the educated, informed, and well-read rabble down here decrying your murder of an artform. Cool story, bro. Some real Jersey Shore shit right there.
I digress.
Anyway, after a little bit of time, the editor contacted me to let me know that the assistant editor had written a response to my letter, but would not allow me final approval of the piece. The primary editor stated this action did not reflect integrity on the magazine’s behalf, therefore the editor would not run the piece at all (either letter and neither doodle). I respected the editor for this decision. That was the right call. And the more I thought about it, and how that interaction went, the more I saw that two things about what I’m doing each week needed to be addressed.
1. I need to refine the rules of my approach to these critiques. It seems at the heart of the disagreement between myself and the assistant editor was that I believe that your pages, TNY, should be used for stand-alone short works of fiction. This means, to me, that the story must be exceptional without knowing who wrote it or if it’s part of a larger work or not. It has to be so good that if a stranger found a sanitized copy of the PDF on the street, they’d stop their whole lives to finish the story. The assistant editor, on the other hand, believes that merit should be given to the story based on the author, the author’s previous publications and/or awards, and the story need not stand alone and could reach out to a larger work for more richness. So, you see, the disagreement was about how you use your pages. Which is fair. I think that’s a reasonable disagreement to have without further guidance. But, TNY, you provide that guidance in my opinion. “The Best Writing Anywhere. Everywhere.” Now, you can see that you have set a standard that matches my “PDF to the stranger” scenario. It means that the writing must stand up without any other supporting information. It doesn’t say “The Best Chapter Segments by Well Known and Lauded New York Literary Writers” or “Medium Quality Work From Previous Nobel Prize Winning Authors”. So, it’s not like I made the standard up. You made it up. Anyway, it means I need to go back and write a more defined “Why?” section to hone that mission statement (TBD on arrival, beotches). Because I could be writing about any other literary magazine, but you sonsabitches choose to throw around bad fucking copy as a slogan and it pisses me off. The rest of literature is also in a fucking tailspin to hell, but they aren’t bragging about the turds they stuff down your throat.
2. The other thing I learned is that people take the shit I say seriously. Like, people expect that I want a magazine to eat all the dicks. One, it’s a fucking magazine. It doesn’t even have a mouth. And two, that’s like billions of human dicks. If you include all mammalian dicks, that’s billions more. That’s just too many dicks. Jesus. These critiques? This is how my very first writing mentor used to edit me. The more bombastic he was, the more I laughed. It means someone is passionate about what they’re doing and also kind of a fucking lunatic. WHICH IS GREAT. Because that’s the kind of people who will really dig in and obsess over shit they care about and make you a better writer. But not here in post-internet land. Here, in these divisive times, I’m a fucking asshole who is waiting outside Condé Nast’s offices with a basket of disembodied dicks. And it showed in this interaction with the magazine. Man did that assistant editor get defensive. Then reacted emotionally, which is an action that has never served me or anyone else well. The only emotion that I expect people to have when they read this shit is laughter followed by the desire to discuss literature. Oh, and to go get some fucking beers and talk about beauty and get tanked together before singing in the street. No, no; not here. In this fucking “Everyone is a unique special snowflake and we are all equal and everyone’s opinions fucking matter” culture that has a horde of people on Twitter ready to cancel any motherfucker that says otherwise, people have forgotten that WE ARE ALL PIECES OF SHIT. Who’s a piece of shit? You’re a piece of shit. I’m a piece of shit. We’re all piles of shit. There is no nobility in being human. We fucking destroy everything we touch. We are the source of so much fucking turmoil for every other species on this planet, and ourselves. Fuck man, even if you talk to no one, you tear yourself apart from the inside. Each one of you fuckers out there shits out an asshole just like I do (except for you colostomy bag guys, and maybe fistula type stuff and other different waste elimination methods I don’t know about; sorry if you feel excluded, you’re making waste just like the rest of us and I want to talk with you about literature as well). I’ve made this comparison in my letters before: There is no difference between you, TNY, not responding to critiques of your literary merit and President Donald Fuckwit Trump removing left wing journalists from the pit. If you can’t stand an opinion that might be opposite of yours, and you choose to disregard it or attempt stifle it, that’s the fucking opposite of civility and democracy. What I’m saying is fucking lighten up, everyone. So you like a story that I don’t. And I like one you don’t. Cool, cool. That’s cool. Let’s fucking talk about it. Show me why it works . TNY, tell me why you print such awful fucking trash. I WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. FUCK, BRO, I WANT A FUCKING JOB. I’m willing to do the work (disclaimer: I will push blind readings of the slushpile from day one). And I’m not stricken with a terrible case of head-in-ass like you seem to be. I’m malleable. Just prove why I should change. Let’s see the big brains on Brad.
Whoa, lots of letters up there in block format. Looking like the standard story selections from TNY.
TL/DR: I’m going to refine my critiquing mission statement and everyone needs to lighten up and realize we are all pieces of shit. Once you’re a piece of shit, you can try to be better. When you are beautiful the way you are, there’s no room for improvement or change.
Anyway, all your stories were fucking terrible this year.
Just kidding.
The metrics:
This year I was unable to finish a whopping 37% of the stories that you deemed “The Best.” I mean, by anyone’s measure, that’s fucking abysmal. And this year I was pushing through the external guilt from some previous conversations about not finishing stories. That’s crazy because in 2018, in which very little guilt was present, I finished 72% of the stories (for easy math, 2019 I finished 63%). It’s almost like you spent last year reading all the things I said not to do and then focused on those as your driving forces for publication for 2019. Just kidding. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Like I actually matter to anyone!
There were some other interesting numbers that stuck out to me as well. I saw the numbers for “Nothing Fucking Happens” go from 11 down to 5 (see previous rating explanation because I can’t be bothered to re-explain it). But I saw the numbers for “Squandered” go from 0 to 6. That means I saw some glimmer in 6 different stories and watched you throw them away. Maybe I was looking for that this year when I wasn’t looking last year. I would have loved to have been employed in some corner office at your shitty magazine honing those stories into fine gems instead of reading them from this distance seeing that you guys were too busy worried about making happy hour and that daily circle jerk. Fuck off.
Oh, this year “Summary” went from 4 to 10. And, anecdotally, I feel like I’m sitting on some trauma from how much fucking summary you forced upon us this year. Admirable, really, that you can disrespect an artform and the people who pay for your jobs, yet you still stay in business. I guess when you brainwash everyone into thinking that your “literature” is literature, then you control that narrative and fanbase. It’s a lot like Fox News, you know? Who cares what the truth is as long as you have readership that pays for your narrative? Winning fucking strategy.
One metric that did stay the same was that I received 0 responses or job offers from you in 2018 and 0 in 2019. Go figure.
And I did rate the stories this year as well, but there were no real gems. There were two that stood out as 4s, but honestly that’s because I felt like I was required to give those scores. Strangely, those two stories both ran on sexual tension. And before you jump to the conclusion that I liked them because I’m a dumb, lizard-brained male, last year’s best story (which was fucking memorable and moved me) was from the perspective of an older lady and it was about escaping a hurricane. And love. So, fuck off.
I guess, maybe you are asking yourself, “Is he going to keep this up?”
Yeah, dude. There’s that great scene in The Shawshank Redemption where he writes letters to the politicians about getting library funding and the warden thinks it’s funny and futile. But it works. He just has to write letters for years. That’s me. Once I accepted I was in a prison of sorts (both as a writer and as a human in many other aspects of my personal life), I realized that in order to win my freedom back, I had to take it. You don’t own my thoughts. You can’t get to me. What are you going to do? Take my birthday away? The moment you write back I win. And I have nothing to lose by emailing you every fucking week for the next year defending one of the great loves of my life: Actual. Fucking. Literature.
So, here’s to 2020. The year in which we achieve first contact. Ha-Ha!
Up your nose with a rubber hose, Kotter.
Nick
