The combination of honesty and writing skill usually makes for a compelling read, and SLG editor Jennifer DeGuzman’s blog fits the bill. This time a bit of Googling turns up some online reactions from people whose pitches she rejected:

Item the first. This artist is upset that the letter is not signed and that it offers no constructive criticism. His friends call me an “asshole” and “douchebag,”* too, for writing on the rejection letter “We already rejected this last year.” Because I totally should have taken into account that the story and art are more developed! Maybe so, but unless we wrote to you saying, “We might reconsider this if you improve the story and art,” we are rejecting the project. Not just the current version of the project. And now I remember this submission and resubmission. Perhaps the art and story were more developed, but it still was not for us. Sorry. Keep working at it. Perhaps if I had time when the rejection had gone out, I would have told this fellow that he has good ideas but he does not yet have the skill to bring them into fruition as a publishable comic, in my opinion. But I thought it better not to offer criticism that isn’t really constructive; this project required a detailed critique for it to improve (“write better and draw better” doesn’t really help, does it?), and I do not have time to offer that, unfortunately.

Oh, and even though Top Shelf’s rejection was personal and signed, he’s still down on them because the handwriting is messy. See what I mean? We editors must be impeccable, peerless and perfect for these people.

The second example is even better!

1 COMMENT

  1. Thanks for sharing this link, Heidi. You’ve become an invaluable source for great blog-reading! Jennifer’s article is hillarious…and a valuable lesson for people who don’t know how to curb their rants on the internet!

  2. CapVsBats: Well, it’s “just product” to the publishers, but most of the time the submitted work means a lot more to the creator. Those submissions are an investment in time and are sometimes very personal expressions. Most people can’t help but feel frustrated, disappointed or hurt–at least in the beginning. Then, hopefully, they develop thicker skins, and learn to have a professional attitude.

    What’s amazing is how short-sighted these particular submitters are and that they don’t seem to mind presenting themselves as jerks on the internet!

  3. Why don’t supposedly web-savvy people understand that anyone in the world can (and eventually will) see what they post? This is exactly why I didn’t put a blog on my website – I know I would just bitch about people I work with and it would come back to bite me!

  4. I only read the first rejection. I thought that both the Slave Labor letter and his response were rather controlled and reasonable.

    However, aside from the great stories you can tell later (Dr. Seuss’ “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street” was rejected by 29 publishers), there really isn’t any reason to publicly show your failures. Thank the gods that someone actually read your comic and sent you a reply. Try again somewhere else, improving as you go along. Or just publish the darn thing yourself, and maybe someone will want to publish something else of yours at a later date.

  5. What’s totally bizarre about that first rejection (if you read the guy’s original post) is this idea that “If I don’t get feedback from publishers, how do I know how to improve?”

    How can anybody say that in this day and age with the Internet, especially some dude who’s using MySpace to begin with? Put your JPGs or PDFs online and allow people to comment! Duh! And how many websites are out there devoted to reviewing all kinds of comics. Send them some pages. Jeez, nowhere to get feedback? The whole world is out there!

  6. How can anybody say that in this day and age with the Internet, especially some dude who’s using MySpace to begin with? Put your JPGs or PDFs online and allow people to comment! Duh! And how many websites are out there devoted to reviewing all kinds of comics. Send them some pages. Jeez, nowhere to get feedback? The whole world is out there!
    Yes, but the feedback is useless. Good Feedback takes time, effort and training/knowledge/skill all three of which are hard to get on the internet. Almost all review sites are (a) mostly concerned with reviews i.e. like/dislike judgements and recommendations or purchase which is only tangentially related to actual criticism and (b) crap, as demonstrated e.g. by the common inability to evaluate the art other than along the intelligible dimension and often not even that.
    In the present case the problem is made worse by the limited exposure of the artist in question, thereby introducing a massive bias in the demographics he has access to. On a larger scale the same is true even of something like newsarama, but there