What We're Looking For
If You Choose To Write About Sex: Special Guidelines
What Scarlet Letters Will NOT Accept
How to Submit Your Work
Required Header Information
Compensation
Rights and Copyright Information
Reprints and Simultaneous Submissions
What We're Looking For
- Visual Arts
Photography, digitally-created images, drawing, painting, sculpture
(photographs of sculpture) and other plastic arts, et cetera.
If it can be shown online in still images, we're all for it. Other
formats (such as flash and shockwave video) may be supported in
the future, but that remains to be seen. Feel free to send proposals.
- Prose Writing - Short Fiction
Erotica is just the beginning. We are interested in all types
and genres of short fiction except for short-shorts or "flash
fiction," which just rub us the wrong way for no particularly
good reason. We're idiosyncratic, yes, we know.
- Prose Writing - Reviews and Criticism
Reviews of books, movies, television, museums, travel, websites,
your favorite beauty products, goods and services, whatever excites
you to write about. These are not advertorials: we want real reviews
that have something to say. Lester Bangs and Pauline Kael are
our special friends. Maybe you can be too!
- Prose Writing - Creative Nonfiction and Essay
If you're passionate and you know it, write about it for us. Almost
any topic is workable, but please, skip the footnotes and the
academentia. Smart is great. Well-read is fabulous. But bookish
and overly-specialized won't fly. Think M.F.K. Fisher and Margaret
Visser, Calvin Trillin and Paul Theroux, Stephen Jay Gould and
Jamaica Kinkaid.
- Poetry
We are happy to consider poetry of many types. Dirty limericks
are probably not one of them. Poets we love include Dylan Thomas,
Gerry Gomez Pearlberg, Yehuda Amichai, Pablo Neruda, Ann Sexton,
Martin Espada, Nuala ni Dhomhnaill, Tess Gallagher, and so on.
- Serial Novelwriting
We are launching a section called Bowl of Serial, which will include
approximately 5 concurrently-running serial novels (at a given
time) novels written in installments, in the tradition of Jules
Verne, Charles Dickens, Henri Murgher, Armistead Maupin, and others.
Serial novelists will be asked to take on a more frequent update
schedule than other writers, as each serial novel will be updated
at least biweekly. There are separate submissions guidelines for
the Bowl of Serial project. Contact Hanne Blank (hanne@hanne.net)
for details.
IF YOU CHOOSE TO WRITE ABOUT SEX:
Our Guidelines for Sex Writers
We're very picky about the sexual writing we like. We've been
doing sex writing for a very long time, both online and in the
print world, as writers, as editors, and as anthologists. We love
and admire quality writing about sexual issues, and look forward
to publishing it for as long as Scarlet Letters exists.
That said, we don't publish anything that doesn't meet our standards
for quality, literary quality, originality, and humane sex-positivity.
If what you write would be at home in Penthouse Forum, it won't
be at home in Scarlet Letters.
This means: sexual description should support the story or work,
not be its primary focus or entirety. Keep it real, make it interesting
and compelling, and find your own, original voice to speak from.
We ask that all prospective contributors of sex-related material
read co-editor Hanne Blank's thoughts on sex writing, which may
be found here.
WHAT SCARLET LETTERS WILL NOT CONSIDER OR PUBLISH
- Crap. Unless it's really terribly funny and you don't mind everyone
laughing at you.
- Work which is discriminatory or biased in nature or tone, which
contains covert or overt bigotry, sexism, violence or libel.
- Work by authors/artists under 18 years of age (without written
and signed parental consent). Yes, this is true for material that
is nonsexual in nature. We will not consider any sexually explicit
material by authors/artists under the age of 18.
- Work which is copyrighted in whole or in part to another artist/author,
or whose rights belong to anyone but the artist/author
(slash fiction and fanfic, for instance, cannot be considered;
however, nonfiction pieces about nonfiction and slash fic may
be considered).
- Work sent in by anyone other than the artist/author unless it
is submitted by an agent of that artist/author with permission
given in
writing (not via e-mail: contact us for the relevant mailing address).
- Sexual memoirs, whether billed as such or merely thinly-veiled.
It's not nice to tell tales out of school, and what's more, you
could get sued in a rather nasty fashion. If it's sexually-explicit
and it's fiction, make sure it's fiction. If it's sexually-explicit
and it's nonfiction, make sure it's about you specifically, not
about other people... because other people often have lawyers.
- Work that is sex-negative, or, in other words, celebrates or supports
sexual practices that are by their nature coercive or
physically or psychologically unsafe for any party. We encourage
the production of works which depict safer sex practices in a
positive light.
- Work that contains sex scenes in which the sex is nonconsensual.
Though we will accept, for instance, fiction and nonfiction work
exploring issues of rape or sexual abuse, we will not accept work
which celebrates or applauds it, or which casts it as an acceptable
source of erotic gratification.
HOW TO SUBMIT YOUR WORK:
ALL SUBMISSIONS:
All submissions must include the subject line "Scarlet Letters
Submission."
Failure to include a subject line that lets us know that the email
is a submission will likely regard in our deleting the e-mail
-- we get too much spam to open everything that comes over the
transom, and if it doesn't look like it applies to us, we will
usually delete it. So make sure it looks like it applies to us
if you want us to look at it.
VISUAL ART: please email Heather Corinna with a link to a webpage (URL)
featuring 20 or more images of your work. We are not interested
in publishing visual work by artists who do not have a substantial
body of work available from which to choose. If you do not have
a webpage but do have scanned images of your work available, please
contact Ms. Corinna to make other arrangements. Heather Corinna's
email: editor@scarletletters.com
NO ATTACHMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED EXCEPT BY PRIOR ARRANGEMENT.
POETRY: we will consider sets of 3 or more poems ONLY. Single poems
will not be considered. A "set" of poems means only that you have
3 or more poems being submitted simultaneously, not that they
are necessarily linked or related in any way. Submissions made
without the Header Information requested below will not be evaluated
and will be deleted unread. Poetry must be e-mailed IN THE BODY
OF AN E-MAIL to Heather Corinna at editor@scarletletters.com
NO ATTACHMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED.
SHORT FICTION: Pieces from 500-7000 words will be considered. Submissions made
without the Header Information requested below will not be evaluated
and will be deleted unread. All submissions must be sent IN THE
BODY OF AN E-MAIL to R. Gay at Diva@magenta.com.
NO ATTACHMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED.
NONFICTION and REVIEWS/CRITICISM: Pieces from 500-7000 words will be considered. Submissions made
without the Header Information requested below will not be evaluated
and will be deleted unread. All submissions must be sent IN THE
BODY OF AN E-MAIL to Rahne Alexander at scarlet@rahne.com.
NO ATTACHMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED.
BOWL OF SERIAL PROJECT: Persons wishing to apply for inclusion in the Bowl of Serial
/ Serial Novels Online Project should contact co-editor Hanne
Blank for detailed information at Hanne@hanne.net.
REQUIRED HEADER INFORMATION
Name (Proper and Pseudonym, if applicable):
Postal Address:
Phone:
E-mail:
Piece Type (fiction/poetry/nonfiction/art):
Title:
Word Count:
Piece (full text or query):
Bio (120 words or fewer, may include URL outlinks):
Initial and include the following statement:
I hereby give permission to Scarlet Letters to publish my work
if accepted, and to be permanently archived following the date
of that issue's publication. I acknowledge the work submitted
is solely my own and that I am over 18 years of age, and, if photography,
all models have signed releases for permission and verified they
are over 18 years of age. I understand Scarlet Letters holds no
rights to my work, save those of publication and archival, but
I will allow sixty days (60 days) pending publication before I
reprint or resubmit the work submitted to another online or electronic
publisher. I understand Scarlet Letters serially copyrights each
issue annually, including my work, but will not become party to
private copyright suits or disputes. I give Scarlet Letters permission
to excerpt or advertise my work or bio information for purposes
of promotion, and to edit my bio or submission as needed, per
my approval. I understand Scarlet Letters retains the right to
choose not to publish my work, or remove my work for any reason
at any time whatsoever at the editors discretion.
___ (Initial)
COMPENSATION
Contributors whose work is published by Scarlet Letters will receive
free lifetime access to the subscription-only Scarlet Letters
archives. Other compensation (advertisement space) *may* be available
upon request. Contributors wishing to inquire about this option
should contact Heather Corinna upon acceptance of their work.
RIGHTS AND COPYRIGHT
We do not hold any exclusive rights to work published in or exhibited
in Scarletletters.com. The creator retains copyright.
We do require that creators grant us a sixty (60) day "lead" period
in which to bill the work as exclusive to Scarlet Letters online.
During that time, the work may NOT be published elsewhere in electronic
form, except on your own private personal website if desired.
However, during that time, you may, if you choose, submit it elsewhere
for future publication. At any time, work submitted to or accepted
by Scarlet Letters may be shown or published in other media (i.e.,
published in dead-tree print or exhibited in meatspace galleries).
Scarlet Letters serially copyrights issues annually, which means
your work is protected under our copyright, though you retain
sole ownership of your work. However, as each contributor retains
full rights to his/her own work, Scarlet Letters cannot be party
to any copyright dispute(s) if that work has been published or
exhibited anywhere else or in addition to Scarlet Letters.
We reserve the right to omit or edit any work submitted or accepted
at any time.
REPRINTS AND SIMULTANEOUS SUBMISSIONS
We are always glad to consider reprints, assuming you can prove
that you have retained rights to the work. We cannot consider
simultaneous submissions if the work has been submitted to other
electronic publishers. We are happy to consider simultaneous submissions
if the other venue to which the work has been submitted is a non-electronic
venue.
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