Dear Jon, Peter etc.

I am enjoying this thread.

If publication is to make something public, with a secondary condition of
some kind of referee process, 1-3 do not fit. They seem to me to be
analogous to distributing among acquaintances, not considered 'publication'
when done with hard copy. 4, 5 and 6 are probably most wisely done with
previously published work, but such work should then be considered as
published in the same way as something that appears in a self-published
book. (A murky area, but not due to the online nature of things.) 7 fits
both parts of the definition. And so does 8, except that like books and
magazines  the work published in 8 is 'out of print'. (Don't usually send a
poem or whatever to another magazine because the first one it appeared in
is no longer available.)

My rule of thumb is to stick to 7 (which of course might become 8). But I
can see in some circumstances 4-6 really working positively for the writer.

All this points to each person needing to work out their own general
strategy about the distribution of their work. If this strategy becomes out
of date - possibly 4-6 look less attractive when you've begun to earn
money/prestige by placing poems elsewhere - then 1) save these for
inclusion in a book 2) ask editors on a case by case basis.

However much we might like to thrash out a uniform policy it would be a
very hard job to get all editors to agree. (The difference between
guidelines for editors and Chris's submission guidelines they respond to is
that Chris was giving advice, not setting up regulations.)

The question that I would like is where does everyone stand on heavy
revisions. If you've had a poem published some years ago, you now see in it
the beginnings of a good poem, you rework it (heavily) and even retitle it.
Is it a new poem? Or as my mother says, 'mutton dressed up as lamb'?

best, Sue


At 01:01 PM 4/23/2005, you wrote:
>   > Let me turn this around and ask in what circumstances you would want to
>   > submit material that had been previously published?
>
>I don't think it can be turned around that way.  In fact, my original point
>didn't assume that one wanted to submit previously published material:  quite
>the contrary, it assumed that one did not want to submit previously published
>material and therefore wanted to clarify whether things which have been
>propagated only on line were to be considered in the category "previously
>published" and therefore shouldn't be submitted.
>In retrospect, the question seems more complicated than I had thought.
>
>Consider the following possible methods of on line distribution of a poem:
>
>     1) emailing it backchannel to a list of correspondents
>
>     2) emailing it to a JISC-like mailing list where it is kept in an archive
>      which is not indexed by Google and other search engines but can be
>      read by anyone who has the archive's password.
>
>    3) emailing it to a list like the above, but one with an archive
>      open to anyone to read.
>
>    4) posting it on a personal web site which is not primarily a literary
>       web site.
>
>    5) posting it on a personal literary web site which is devoted only
>       to one's own poetry.
>
>    6) posting it on a poetry depository like poemhunter.com.
>
>    7) having it accepted for inclusion on an established poetry web site,
>       where it remains available for anyone to read.
>
>    8) having had it accepted for inclusion on an established poetry
>       web site which has been taken off line and is no longer available
>       to anyone via the internet.
>
>Which are publication?  Surely most people would say that 1) is not.  But if
>1) is not, then 2) probably isn't either:  in both cases the poem's access
>remains private.  3) 4) 5) and 6) seem to me capable of being argued either
>way, 7) seems arguably to be publication, and 8) I think is very muddy.  If on
>line "publication" were only 7) the question might be easy to settle, but in
>fact 7) isn't even clearly the standard.  I'm sure that many people reading
>this, like myself, have done all of the above.
>
>   > Compare poetry publication with academic journals. These too exist
>   > in print and virtual form. There is no intrinsic prestige issue
>   > related to themedium, prestige being vested in the peers doing the
>   > peer review.
>
>Having spent many years in the academic world in a previous incarnation, I
>didn't find this to be at all true. In my experience, the calculus "scholarly
>reputation = pages published x prestige of venue" was strict and universal.
>
>
>=====================================
>Jon Corelis   [log in to unmask]
>
>     www.geocities.com/joncpoetics
>=====================================
>
>
>____________________________________________________________________
>