Everyone loves me, except you.
In my creative writing workshop, we're required to give our classmates written feedback on their work. One of my classmates is not, I guess, especially fond of me. He wrote, among other things,
"This thing festered. And how can you actually use the phrase "fairly pretentious dilettante" without bleeding out of your eyes and exploding from the irony? If I had one story left I'd write in a Jeff. And he'd be a tiresome self-indulgent masturbator.... I just don't feel like saying any more about this story. Get your hands out of your pants the next time you write something."
OK, so, uh, I guess he doesn't love my work. I guess he doesn't even much like it or, in all probability, me. He's not wrong about some of it. I am a self-indulgent masturbator, though the tiresome thing is way out in left field. I like to think of myself as a fresh and charming self-indulgent masturbator. And he seems to think I'm a "pansy pussyfoot assface" (his words, not mine), which is way off-base. But he also seems to think that I'm not self-indulgent enough that I'm not going to find his excessive of spite incredibly funny and he probably didn't realize that I would read his evaluation as an especially funny introduction to my story at an open-mic. In fact, I may always read it as an introfucktion. It's that charming to me. Equally charming, is this email I got the same day:
"Okay.. you don't know me, and this might be a little odd, but what the hell. Months ago, I got a free little book of writing and stuff called "Montage", and I absolutely loved the one called "December 21st." Maybe it's because I'm a smoker, more than likely it's just that I find something particularly satisfying about smoking in December. Regardless, I loved it, and saved the book with the intention of sending whoever the hell Jeff W was a message telling him that. But I forgot.... for about three months, actually. So I was JUST cleaning out my room, found the book again, and decided to finally fucking send you this message. So kudos. Consider your work officially stuck on my bulletin board."
Which is really sweet. It's a lot more difficult to send someone a message that isn't offensive. I mean, for me. Maybe y'all love writing nice notes to strangers, but there's always so much more to dislike than like that getting fan mail from this apparently slovenly, procrastinating, smoker is just really goddamn nice. I'm touched. In the head. And in the heart.
And yesterday, I got a package in the mail. Two print copies of the national undergrad journal that contains my single published story. Which is nice. I was less than overjoyed, however, to find work in that journal that was simultaneously published in Montage. I mean, I guess it doesn't matter, but he was one of the most talented writers we published last issue and I would have liked to have a monopoly on more than one of his poems.
So, screw you Dave Landsberger.
"This thing festered. And how can you actually use the phrase "fairly pretentious dilettante" without bleeding out of your eyes and exploding from the irony? If I had one story left I'd write in a Jeff. And he'd be a tiresome self-indulgent masturbator.... I just don't feel like saying any more about this story. Get your hands out of your pants the next time you write something."
OK, so, uh, I guess he doesn't love my work. I guess he doesn't even much like it or, in all probability, me. He's not wrong about some of it. I am a self-indulgent masturbator, though the tiresome thing is way out in left field. I like to think of myself as a fresh and charming self-indulgent masturbator. And he seems to think I'm a "pansy pussyfoot assface" (his words, not mine), which is way off-base. But he also seems to think that I'm not self-indulgent enough that I'm not going to find his excessive of spite incredibly funny and he probably didn't realize that I would read his evaluation as an especially funny introduction to my story at an open-mic. In fact, I may always read it as an introfucktion. It's that charming to me. Equally charming, is this email I got the same day:
"Okay.. you don't know me, and this might be a little odd, but what the hell. Months ago, I got a free little book of writing and stuff called "Montage", and I absolutely loved the one called "December 21st." Maybe it's because I'm a smoker, more than likely it's just that I find something particularly satisfying about smoking in December. Regardless, I loved it, and saved the book with the intention of sending whoever the hell Jeff W was a message telling him that. But I forgot.... for about three months, actually. So I was JUST cleaning out my room, found the book again, and decided to finally fucking send you this message. So kudos. Consider your work officially stuck on my bulletin board."
Which is really sweet. It's a lot more difficult to send someone a message that isn't offensive. I mean, for me. Maybe y'all love writing nice notes to strangers, but there's always so much more to dislike than like that getting fan mail from this apparently slovenly, procrastinating, smoker is just really goddamn nice. I'm touched. In the head. And in the heart.
And yesterday, I got a package in the mail. Two print copies of the national undergrad journal that contains my single published story. Which is nice. I was less than overjoyed, however, to find work in that journal that was simultaneously published in Montage. I mean, I guess it doesn't matter, but he was one of the most talented writers we published last issue and I would have liked to have a monopoly on more than one of his poems.
So, screw you Dave Landsberger.
posted by jw at
11:27 AM
1 Comments:
So I'm sitting at work, not working, and I google my name. I figure, hey, maybe there's somebody out there with my name...and there are (including someone with a penchant for chinese propaganda)...but then I saw this thread related to writing. So I click on it. And it says "Screw You Dave Landsberger"
Yep. That's me. And thanks but no thanks Jeff.
Here's what happened. "Shambles" was accepted at Montage and the other unnamed journal. I contacted the other unnamed journal and asked them politely to pull it, seeing as how I'd rather give it to Montage as U of I was my school. They were a bit disappointed but they understood and said they would do it.
Fast Forward to last week. I get the unnamed journal and open it. The first words out of my mouth are "Oh shit, someone's gonna be pissed" Immediately I thought of Madonick calling me a dirty two-timing German who can't be trusted.
I apologize for the confusion. And I do understand the gravity of the situation, if this were the "real" publishing world, I would be royally fucked. And thank you for your kind words. I finally got Montage in the mail today and I was very pleasantly surprised. I'm in the process of reading it now.
The internet is a big place.
Take Care Jeff
- Dave
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