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Abigail Nussbaum, in reviewing The Del Rey Book of SF&F discusses the differences in what she finds in magazines and webzines vs original anthologies.
Asking the Wrong Questions
I just tried posting a comment in response to the below paragraph but my long post was lost so I'll just try it again here.
"There's a flipside to this, however, which became apparent when I scanned the author bios in The Del Rey Book and discovered that not a single one of its contributors was a first time writer. The reason that the genre short story scene is still vibrant is that there's a relatively low threshold for entry, with new writers making sales and putting their material before an audience every month. Just as the investment of time and money in original story anthologies dwarfs that afforded to any month's issue of a magazine, so, presumably, do the hurdles first time writers have to clear before they're published in those anthologies become tougher, perhaps even impossible, to overcome. I rarely read magazines for just the reasons stated above--because there's so much dross to wade through, and I'd rather wait for other readers to do that work and discover new voices for me. But if magazines and other venues like them become an endangered species, and original story anthologies become the dominant delivery system for new short fiction, those new voices might peter out. This should not be construed as a specific criticism of Datlow, who as I've said has put together a strong anthology whose table of contents is by no means dominated by heavy hitters, but it is telling that all but two of the contributors to The Del Rey Book were published in SciFiction, and that several of them published their best-know stories and made their reputation there. If it weren't for the webzine, would Datlow have had as varied and talented a stable of authors to approach when she made up The Del Rey Book?"
My response:
As a short story editor at OMNI and SCIFICTION, I've had the opportunity to work with newer writers who I've later used in original anthologies. And I've read hundreds of short stories in the sf/f/h fields for the past 22 years while reading for the YBFH. So I'm in a position (with a very few other editors) to have access to many many writers. When I was at OMNI I went out of my way to read the original anthologies featuring new or newer writers and asked them to submit to OMNI. Many did. Some I bought.
I've taught Clarion four times in the past 20 years and Clarion South once. Through that I've met a lot of young writers whose work I've encouraged (and even bought). So has Gardner Dozois.
Magazines to some extent face the same reality original anthologies do. There have to be enough recognizable names per issue/book for readers to even pick them up.
While at OMNI I rarely bought a first story -at SCIFICTION I bought several. I've even occasionally bought first stories for my anthologies.
Asking the Wrong Questions
I just tried posting a comment in response to the below paragraph but my long post was lost so I'll just try it again here.
"There's a flipside to this, however, which became apparent when I scanned the author bios in The Del Rey Book and discovered that not a single one of its contributors was a first time writer. The reason that the genre short story scene is still vibrant is that there's a relatively low threshold for entry, with new writers making sales and putting their material before an audience every month. Just as the investment of time and money in original story anthologies dwarfs that afforded to any month's issue of a magazine, so, presumably, do the hurdles first time writers have to clear before they're published in those anthologies become tougher, perhaps even impossible, to overcome. I rarely read magazines for just the reasons stated above--because there's so much dross to wade through, and I'd rather wait for other readers to do that work and discover new voices for me. But if magazines and other venues like them become an endangered species, and original story anthologies become the dominant delivery system for new short fiction, those new voices might peter out. This should not be construed as a specific criticism of Datlow, who as I've said has put together a strong anthology whose table of contents is by no means dominated by heavy hitters, but it is telling that all but two of the contributors to The Del Rey Book were published in SciFiction, and that several of them published their best-know stories and made their reputation there. If it weren't for the webzine, would Datlow have had as varied and talented a stable of authors to approach when she made up The Del Rey Book?"
My response:
As a short story editor at OMNI and SCIFICTION, I've had the opportunity to work with newer writers who I've later used in original anthologies. And I've read hundreds of short stories in the sf/f/h fields for the past 22 years while reading for the YBFH. So I'm in a position (with a very few other editors) to have access to many many writers. When I was at OMNI I went out of my way to read the original anthologies featuring new or newer writers and asked them to submit to OMNI. Many did. Some I bought.
I've taught Clarion four times in the past 20 years and Clarion South once. Through that I've met a lot of young writers whose work I've encouraged (and even bought). So has Gardner Dozois.
Magazines to some extent face the same reality original anthologies do. There have to be enough recognizable names per issue/book for readers to even pick them up.
While at OMNI I rarely bought a first story -at SCIFICTION I bought several. I've even occasionally bought first stories for my anthologies.
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I have had readers come up to me (or post) that they buy everything with my name on it which pleases me very much. I guess it's all branding isn't it? ;-)
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