From child to adult, from single to married, from childless to raising a family. Further, not having a job, to being a worker, and from worker to retired person, and many nuances of life in between. On a more ‘right now’ basis, there is not having a dangerous virus to stay safe from, to being here, now, with Covid-19 threatening our lives, our livelihoods, and our lifestyles.
These changes are what I am hoping to capture, with the anthology I am editing, and looking for submissions to. The title for the anthology is ‘Plague Invasion’, with the subtitle of ‘Creative Writing Responses to Covid-19’. In the book are poetry and prose responses to this odd, weird new way of being.
The closing date for submissions is 31 July 2020. but it may have enough words in the book before then. I’m hoping for a good sized book, whatever that means – more than 70,000 words for sure, and up to, I’d say 140,000 words, although that higher number seems a little overly optimistic, but who knows …
I’m asking for up to three poems of up to thirty lines, and had previously been asking for 2,000 words of prose in up to three different pieces, but thinking about that word count, I’ve decided to raise it to 3,000 words. This will assist a couple of contributors, who have written more, great words about the theme, and it will assist in raising the overall word count for the anthology. I like the way this stays with the overall number ‘three’ in there too.
And to be brutally honest, I’m one of the contributors who would have to cut some of the word count of one of my submissions to this project, and I can’t see how to do that, without making one of my prose pieces a lesser thing.
If that is selfish, so be it. This is my project, opened up to others, for sure, but still mine. The more words that are in there, and the better the quality and wider the range of works there, the better it will display responses to the time we’re currently living in.
Responding to change is how we can grow in our lives. Things happen, we react, and we learn now and hopefully better ways. If they turn out not to be better, then we change again, holding onto the best, and moving forward with the new. So 3,000 words for your prose, not 2,000 in total. Editing is a good thing when you write, but sometimes the editing process takes out needed things, and that is bad.
If you’d like to be involved in this project, send your words to me at kittycordo@gmail.com with the subject of ‘Plague Invasion submission’. All contributors who have work chosen will receive a free copy of the book. Australian residents will have their copy posted to them free of charge, others will need to pay the postage and handling costs. Thank you!
Carolyn Cordon - Creative 