Hello, readers!
As the second week of the new semester slowly comes to a close, I thought it might be best to introduce myself.
My name is Lucy Kiefert and I will be the editor-in-chief of the Hedge Apple for Spring 2020. I am currently completing my final semester at HCC and, as I do so, I will also be in charge of online and print duties for the magazine from now through May. Needless to say, I am very excited to come into contact with you all over the course of the coming weeks as submissions continue to roll in. Having the privilege to partake in others’ art (of all kinds) has always been deeply refreshing and inspiring to me.
To offer some guidance for anyone who plans on submitting to our issues this semester (Themes to be announced in the next few days!), below are what I consider to be my editor expectations as well as my personal writing/reading aesthetic. I hope it sparks something in you — perhaps, even, a new piece will come out of it.
Happy Writing! I look forward to hearing from you.
— Lucy
EXPECTATIONS: Much of what I derive my vision as an editor from has to do with how much heart I can detect in someone’s work. Oftentimes, if I’m reading something and it feels half-baked or simply thrown on the page without much care for how it sounds or what it illustrates, I lose interest — if the author can’t even seem to care about what they’re saying, it does not come naturally to me to want to do that for them. Additionally, unconventionality, uniqueness, and insight are just a few characteristics that can make a difference for me as an editor. Overall, this is what I would ask of any submissions I get: that they’re thought out, with passion behind them, sent in by writers who — no matter what it is that they’re writing about — devote themselves to that idea. I want work I can get behind, throw my support into, and be able to spend a chunk of time editing if I have to simply because I believe in it. If I can connect with the author’s intentions in some way, and sense the power in what they’re trying to create, whether it’s through a beautifully worded line or a vivid image, then I consider the piece successful. And I’d be more than likely to include it.
AESTHETIC: Anything grimy, gritty, glam, grunge, sweeping, flowing, dynamic, vintage, rustic, raw; catching a bullet between your teeth; the happy in the sad, the sad in the happy; the dark in the bright, the bright in the dark; things meaning a little more to you than they probably should; a single second stretched into an eternity; nighttime; the importance of where you are, how it looks, and how it makes you feel; heat of the moment; kicking over the table; screaming just because you want to; whining about everything and calling yourself out for it… but then choosing to own it instead; romanticizing things that never even happened; feeling like a phony… but then choosing to own it instead; accepting that you’re rather small and the world is rather big (but believing all the while that something is undeniably waiting for you out there); there is no such thing as coincidence (This was meant to happen.); putting together what absolutely should not go together (But it works, doesn’t it?); chaos and peace are not mutually exclusive; sifting through everyday occurrences for some sort of meaning and coming up empty, doing it again and coming up with your hands full; seeing the beauty in the mundane and the ugly and the terrible because we’re writers… and so there is beauty in everything… because there has to be.