Interview with Mark Maynard

The Mark Maynard I spoke with is not the furniture mogul from England.  Sorry.  Also he is not the Mark Maynard of markmaynard.com who hails from Ypisilanti, Michigan and writes choice cuts like, “While everyone else within several thousand miles is watching the Super Bowl tonight, I’m filling Severed Unicorn Head orders while listening to archival audio of a much younger Doug Skinner talking about collecting the works of outsider artist, Pantuso.”  The Mark Maynard I was interested in talking to is a freelance writer and the fiction editor at The MeadoW.  His story Alpha Mail was recently published in The Duck & Herring Co. Pocket Field Guide.

Shelf Life: How'd did you get the editor gig?

Mark Maynard: Well, the gig is strictly voluntary. I actually started out on The MeadoW's editorial board as part of my graduate field study for my MFA program. Eventually, after months of hard work, the managing editor nominated me to be the fiction editor and the rest of the board voted me into the position.  As a writer of short-fiction myself, I wanted to see what it was like on the other side of the submission pile -- to read and evaluate work much like I was sending out to other journals. And for the chance to do some rejecting of my own. I highly recommend that anyone interested in reading or writing great prose or poetry get involved with a local literary magazine, and, if one does not exist, than do like my friend, Ryan and start your own! You might even become rich and famous, although no doubt you won't become either of those because of your involvement with a literary magazine.

 SL: Right. Unless we put commercials up for Fox’s House or Cheese Whiz, Shelf Life isn't making any money. It certainly shows how passionate you are about literature that you are doing this MeadoW thing for free without complaining.

MM: Not only do I do it for free and without complaining, but it is actually a real honor to sit on the editorial board of The MeadoW. There are very few local publishing opportunities for writers and poets in Northern Nevada and that gives the editorial board at the MeadoW a lot of responsibility. There is a lot of trust put into an editor by writers. Each story is like an author's child and here they are willing to part with this piece of them, their own flesh and blood, and they are trusting that you will do your best to find it a great home. Unfortunately, most of the stories we receive leave our slush pile as orphans, but there is a gravity that is given to reading each story, and it is truly a pleasure to read fresh, new work by a variety of authors.

 SL: Why's the W in Meadow captialized?

MM: Because it's eye-catching, memorable and makes people ask questions such as "Why is the W in MeadoW capitalized?"

SL: Touche. What's the most common mistake people make when submitting?

MM: By far the most common mistake is not following the submission guidelines.  It is also very annoying to try and read manuscripts that are printed in funky fonts, psychedelic colors and/or with creative margins and line-spacing that cause an editor to soon feel like tiny ants are marching across the page.

SL: Are there subjects that turn you off right away?

MM: No. So far this year I have read a prison story where the incarcerated characters are all dragons and wolves, a love story involving a door-to-door saleslady and a dwarf and a fable involving Illinois-hating pike from Wisconsin. None of these subjects has turned me off, and actually, all of them intrigued me. What really attracts me to a story (and conversely what truly causes adverse reactions) is not the subject, but the effortless control of the language used in the story. Nothing undermines an original idea or a truly creative plot like sloppy, amateur or just plain bad writing just like the most mundane day-in-the-life of a boring office worker can be transformed into something incredibly memorable and moving by a careful, well-developed use of language.

SL: Do you ever see people doing obvious ripoffs of famous writers?

MM: I don't think I see many obvious rip offs from a style standpoint. There is quite a bit of Anne Rice/Stephen King style subject matter but it tends to get bogged down in ill-defined universes of the author's own creation.
I would say that if you are going to emulate another author, really go for it. Try to find what that author did with the language and then ape it for all it's worth -- you never know what you might discover about your own talent. Most of the great writers found their own voices by imitating the work of those they read and admired. If anything, I think people don't go for it enough in their writing. If you are going to emulate Hemingway -- don't hold back! It's not like someone is going to reject you because you wrote too much like Hemingway. If you can even get halfway there, then I'm probably pulling your work out of the slush pile and sharing it with the other readers and editors.

SL: You've put together a seminar on getting published in lit. journals, can you give us some of the highlights?

MM: I think the most interesting thing that I have discovered about the submission process is the staggering amount of rejections that all writers are going to face over the course of their careers. Whether you are Steve Almond, Todd Goldberg or just someone who is submitting a first story, the rejection letters are going to come at you fast and seemingly without end. The best thing that you can do is to use resources such as Duotrope's Digest (www.duotrope.com) and New Pages (www.newpages.com) to find the best place to submit your story.

SHELFLIFEMAGAZINE ARCHIVES: issue #002