The Journal: Standard Manuscript Format, Sort Of

In today’s Journal

* Quotes of the Day
* Standard Manuscript Format (certain silly rules)
* Yesterday
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

Quotes of the Day

“If you don’t stand for something, you will fall for anything.” Peter Marshall et al down through the ages

“It’s easy enough to stand for something if you don’t have a personal stake.” Wes Crowley

So anyway, awhile back I posted a link in the Journal to the new “standard” manuscript format. It’s what writers are supposed to follow now when they submit manuscripts to magazines for consideration.

The basic format itself is the same old typical stone-age crap from back when manuscripts were typed or printed on dot-matrix printers: Times New Roman or Courier, 12 point font, double spaced, text beginning 1/3 to 1/2 of the way down page 1 (for some inane reason), the first line of each paragraph indented by a half-inch, and so on. Same format I learned way back in high school.

But now there’s a new twist. After the author name in the upper left-hand corner of the first page, now you’re supposed to add, in parentheses, your “preferred personal pronouns.” So after my name, I’m supposed to add (he/him) or I suppose (she/her) or maybe even (it/can of soup) if I want. No word on whether one is expected to indicate which particular kind of soup.

I have lived entirely too long. I have somehow managed to outlive common sense, which, even in my younger years, seemed more a luxury to many than something we all had in common.

Anyway, a writer emailed me to ask what he should put in the parentheses.

I told him I have no suggestions. I formatted one manuscript that way, complete with (he/him) following my name, and I still haven’t gotten the sour taste out of my mouth. But that’s just me. I’m not that wild about capitulating to some dweeb sitting in a safe space trying to decide what to be offended by today.

So in the future when I submit a manuscript to a magazine, I will omit the parentheses and whatever the editor expects to see inside them. For one thing, it’s none of their business.

Either that or maybe I’ll play with them a bit:

Harvey Stanbrough (it/Campbell’s Tomato) or
Harvey Stanbrough (I/me) or
Harvey Stanbrough (bite me/go pound sand).

But I’ll probably just leave that space blank. I’d rather spend what little creative talent I have writing fiction than bowing to some spoiled, pretentious moron. Besides, frankly, I couldn’t begin to care less what someone else “assumes” are my “preferred pronouns.”

Assumptions don’t change facts. And I’m just not the kind to get “offended” by such a trivial event as someone I’ve never met (and probably never will) losing sleep over which pronouns to use to refer to me in a conversation they will never have. Or crying themselves to sleep because I refuse to do as I’m told.

But wait—if you’re a director or a producer and you want to paying me a sh-boatload of money to stand in a certain place on a stage or in front of a camera and say certain words in a certain way, that’s fine. Otherwise, uhh, no. You’ve got the wrong guy.

So to that writer and anyone else faced with this existential dilemma, either follow your name with parentheses and stick your preferred personal pronouns between them or don’t. Doesn’t matter either way to me.

If an editor exists out there who would reject a submission without even reading it because I choose not to inform him, her, or it of my preferred personal pronouns, then he, she, or it doesn’t deserve to read my work anyway. (To that editor—grow a backbone already.)

I’ll be back in the next day or two with an actual topic, probably something on the most important grouping of words in any language.

Yesterday I rolled out before 2 a.m., but I was in such a lousy mood I didn’t even move over to the writing computer until almost 10. I don’t like taking the world’s (well, the United States’) inane BS to my writing computer with me. Ugh.

I finally wrote just over 1000 words. Couldn’t get my head into a running story. Bizarre. Finally around noon I decided to take a day doing other things. Back to the novel today.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

See “Top 10 Success Tips from Prince” at https://writersinthestormblog.com/2021/04/top-10-success-tips-from-prince/. Thanks to Sam for the tip.

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………………… 740 words

Writing of Terra 2 (novel)

Day 1…… 3535 words. Total words to date…… 3535
Day 2…… 4660 words. Total words to date…… 8195
Day 3…… 3739 words. Total words to date…… 11934
Day 4…… 3638 words. Total words to date…… 15572
Day 5…… 2882 words. Total words to date…… 18454
Day 6…… 4777 words. Total words to date…… 23231
Day 7…… 3531 words. Total words to date…… 26762
Day 8…… 2785 words. Total words to date…… 29547
Day 9…… 1005 words. Total words to date…… 30552

Total fiction words for April……… 30552
Total fiction words for the year………… 317629
Total nonfiction words for April… 5670
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 73070
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 390699

Calendar Year 2021 Novels to Date…………………… 6
Calendar Year 2021 Novellas to Date……………… X
Calendar Year 2021 Short Stories to Date… 3
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 60
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31

Disclaimer: In this blog, I provide advice on writing fiction. I advocate a technique called Writing Into the Dark. To be crystal clear, WITD is not “the only way” to write, nor will I ever say it is. However, as I am the only writer who advocates WITD both publicly and regularly, I will continue to do so, among myriad other topics.

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