I received this rejection note from the New Yorker back in 1991. I put it aside until it became part of a pile of papers in my inbox and then a forgotten note buried in a file box with other items that I figured I needed to keep. But why? Why did I keep it? Why didn’t I just toss it in the can with a little shot of the “right back at you” dejection that I obviously felt by getting the thing in the first place? Because it came from the New Yorker, that’s why. This wasn’t just rejection, this was rejection by the absolute best. My manuscript sat on someone’s desk at The New Yorker for at least a few hours before it was returned to me. During that time, my words took up the same space once occupied by stories and poems from some of America’s finest writers. And now these words – “We regret that we are unable to used the enclosed material…” – from the editors of the New Yorker were proof of that fact. How do you throw away a note, even a rejection note, from the New Yorker?
Well, that was then. I’m not quite so philosophical about the rejection note these days. Now that I’ve unearthed it after fourteen years, I feel the time is right to get rid of the thing once and for all. But I don’t want to just throw it away. I want to give it a proper send-off. Next month I will be in San Francisco, a great literary city. I’m thinking of taking the rejection letter with me. There’s a bar I like to visit when I’m out there called Vesuvio Café. It’s in the North Beach neighborhood. Jack Kerouac used to get falling down drunk there. I love this place.
The plan is to walk into Vesuvio café, take the rejection letter from my pocket, fold it up into a little square, and use it to shore up the leg of the wobbliest bar stool in the place. Then I’ll sit down atop that stool, order a beer and smile.
6 comments:
Brilliant idea, a proper burial. Can I attend?
I love Vesuvio Café. But what you should do is let someone else use the rejection slip. Leave it at the bar, near someone with obvious carpal tunnel and an air of abject desperation. You might give them hope. Or at least an alibi for those late nights when one says one is "at the late night coffee shop working on that book."
great plan. you should write a poem/story about the experience while you're sitting there!!
Maybe you could tape it to the bottom of your stool/chair/table, whatever's holding you up at the point of intoxication...
I'd at least spill a beer on it (but not a good one).
I've never gotten such stationary but the words are so familiar... I used to keep mine but decided they belonged in the circular file instead of the retangular one.
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