Editeyes

I’ve always been fascinated by the fluidity and flexibility of the English language. While other English teachers found the use of contractions and slang in student papers a fault, I wanted to take a closer look and see if perhaps the student’s word choice revealed a sub-text or at least more than one level of communication at work in the paper.

I find it exciting to watch new words emerge and take hold in the language. For instance, I’ve watched with fascination as the word “text” has turned from a noun to a verb with the advent of text-messaging.

Journalists are perhaps most effective in creating, adopting, and adapting new words that eventually make it into the lexicon through formal inclusion into the dictionary. I haven’t done the research, but I suspect that poets are also a source of new words (though perhaps not quite so rapidly and directly as those moved forward by journalists), for poets know and enjoy language with particular relish.

My friend, poet Mary Meriam, has written a poem in which she introduces a new word for same-sexed partners who join in marriage. I’m not going to reprint the poem here as it is awaiting its initial publication in the CHIRON REVIEW. However, I do want to showcase the word which I initially read on the Lesbian Writers List-serve when Mary first posted her poem and the word with its definition.

Mary’s poem is lovely in setting the stage and rational for this new word, so forgive me dear poet if I do the word a disservice by plopping it down here without the poem:

The word is marae.
Will you be my rae?

rae [RAY]
-noun - the affectionate, legal, and religious term for the spouse or partner of a gay or lesbian person.

marae [ma-RAY]
-verb - to join as spouses or to take as a spouse, in the marriage of a gay or lesbian person.

The neologisms rae and marae are derived from “My Rae,” the name Lillian Faderman gave to her courageous and devoted aunt. As a new term for gay and lesbian partners, “my rae” honors Lillian Faderman’s tremendous courage and devotion to gays and lesbians. “Marae” means “sacred place” in Polynesia. At the marae, culture is celebrated, customs are explored and debated, and weddings and birthdays are held. [(c) 2008 Mary Meriam]

So what do you think? Will this word make its way into our lexicon? Would you use it?

 

Tags: Word Wise by ph
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Poet Kate Evans has responded to my blog about publishing gay and lesbian memoir on her blog Being and Writing. I met Kate at the East of Eden Conference where she was promoting her book of poetry Like All We Love and I was pitching my book to agents.

I didn’t find an agent at that conference, but meeting Kate was probably even more important in the bigger picture of writing and publishing. First, she connected me with the press for her book, Q-Press, a sadly now defunct entity and not part of the story I told in my Publishing Journey. Though I didn’t go with Q-Press, it was an important step in the journey. Talking with them and with Kate, I  got more clear about what I wanted with regard to publication. What I learned is that I wanted more control over the timing of the publication, and Q-Press (who was probably going under at the time) was not moving too swiftly. One thing I can say about Outskirts Press is that they move swiftly.

Another thing I learned from Kate was that she had written a book, Negotiating the Self, that held important information for me as a “new” lesbian who was a teacher.  This book caused a crucial paradigm shift, for it helped me understand the edges of my homophobia and gave me some strategies for managing my fears in the classroom which undoubtedly made my classes more inclusive for all.

Then there was Kate herself: enthusiastic, generous and bold. Watching her, I saw what it takes to promote one’s book and also one’s self as a writer.  I’ve recently reconnected with Kate via the Women Stirred web site where she is a contributor. Again the timing of our meeting is perfect. Kate Evans is one of those risky writers who serve as a pathfinder for me.

If you are looking for models for your own writing life, I recommend following Kate Evans.

Tags: Going Public by ph
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Electing to self-publish my book Between Two Women was not an easy decision. I wanted my book to be selected by a publisher for I believed that would be the ultimate acknowledgement that the work was worthy—both in terms of content and skillful writing.

I spent three years sending my manuscript to agents and publishers. I followed guidelines in books like

Into Print by Poets & Writers,

How To Get Happily Published by Judith Applebaum,

Putting Your Passion into Print by Arielle Eckstut & David Henry Sterry.

I carefully crafted query letters and developed a one-minute elevator pitch which I gave to multiple agents at the East of Eden Writers’ Conference. I sent my queries out and participated in the Maui Manuscript Marketplace.  I created a book proposal and sent it upon request to agents. Here is a sample of the responses I got:

You are a talented writer  [but] memoir has become a difficult genre to place.

We’ve just done a rash of lesbian memoirs so have to work on other things.

We found your memoir to be quiet well done . . . but feel it would be a very tough sell to commercial publishers.

I consistently got the message that since my book’s appeal was to a niche market, I should query small presses directly, particularly those who published books in my so-called niche. That’s when I learned that narrative non-fiction does not bode well as a calling card because fiction sells and therefore keeps small presses afloat. I got rejection letters from Alyson Press, Spinsters Ink, Cleis Press, and Firebrand. As Nickie Hastie says: “How can we buy the books they decide not to publish?”

After considerable rejection, I was thrilled when I friend helped me through the door of University of Wisconsin Press, introducing me and my manuscript to editor, Raphael Kadushin of the Living Out Series: Gay & Lesbian Autobiography. I got an email request from Kadushin to send the manuscript which I submitted immediately and then waited hopefully with only a tiny niggle of doubt.

I had studied the list of books published in the series. They had only published two books each in the previous two years and all four were about or by famous gay men, and the year my friend’s book was published, it was one of six books published and was the only lesbian book. Read what you will into these facts but note that after waiting for six weeks, I received a form letter (that was not signed) saying, “We have decided that your work does not coincide with our current publishing plans.”

A couple of months later I read an article in Writers’ Digest, Dec. 07 about gay and lesbian writing. Kadushin was interviewed and had this to say: “Coming out stories are no longer published unless they are wildly new or have a universal angle.”  He followed this remark with: “Writers [LGBT] have little aptitude to be truly dangerous or daring.”

That’s when I had a change of attitude. I knew my book contained essential stories about women in general and lesbians in particular, and therefore needed to find its way into print as a concrete historical record. It appeared that the only way to accomplish this was to self-publish.

The self-publishing journey is yet another interesting story.  More on that later.

Tags: That's Personal, Write Right by ph
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