Bring Back the Pulp Rags: An Appetite for Cereals
Or Serials…One of Them…
Know what I would read the shit out of? And submit the hell out of? A brand new pulp rag. A mag that publishes a regular dose of short form fiction that you would never consider referring to as “important,” “literary,” or — the cardinal sin — “edgy.” But you would refer to it as entertaining.
Emphases here are on the “short form” and the “dose.”
What I envision is a re-invigoration of the publishing climate of Charles Dickens and, later, the pulp mags. In those eras you could make a living as a writer of entertaining fiction because printing was cheap and so distribution overheads were low, urban centers were unprecedented, and the working class was the place where money moved. The working class is important because the appetite there is for entertainment, not “stimulation.”
These days, magazines that publish short form fiction seem entirely to fall into the category of “literary” and aspiring towards “Literature,” with the big L. It’s difficult to enjoy anything that you can call “Literature” with a big L. That’s the stuff you teach in college lit classes, and society needs that stuff, and some people read that stuff…. But a lot of us just want to read for fun.
Where are the fun journals publishing short fiction? Where can I go to read short stories written by someone whose imagination was invaded by a horde led by Conan the Barbarian and John Carter of Mars, and they never let go? Not even in the face of Cthulhu and his new thrall, Flash Gordon.
I want a renewal of pulp mags.
Like the ones that Charles Dickens helped invent, although he didn’t realize it.
I’d submit to a magazine like that, because a magazine like that would sell. In this magazine, none of the pop-lit words or phrases would appear in their submission guidelines. No “something different,” no “something that makes us think,” no — the cardinal sin — “edgy.”
Come on, literary journal people! You are ALL asking for the same dumb artsy thing: something new that makes us think. What the hell does that even mean? Practically nothing, if it’s the same from everyone. If you ALL ask for it, then you’ll never stand out, no one will read you, and no one will care.
You can’t change the world anonymously.
You can be relevant and entertaining at the same time.
Not for everyone, perhaps. But this would be a flavor for some. Charles Dickens would be surprised as hell to learn that he’s on lists of “significant authors.” He wrote to entertain. He wrote for the money. And, at the same time, he remembered his integrity, and he wrote to say true things and significant things, but he never wrote thinking to himself that what he said would matter for generations to come. He wrote what he saw as significant to a particular group at a particular time. It is possible to do this.
By the way, know who else wrote for the money? Shakespeare. That’s who. He wrote what was popular. He wrote to appeal to fans.
He also wrote to appeal to himself, because it’s possible to be entertaining and self-reflective at the same time.
As H.P. Lovecraft could also tell you, if he ever got his head out of his ass for a few minutes and stopped feeling sorry for himself. (He did, later in life, as it happens.)
Ask Neil Gaiman and Stephen King
If they’d read and submit to a cerealized — serialized, I’m just being obnoxious — journal that publishes short-form fiction that entertains.
Ask them if they think that’s a good idea. They’ll probably say “dude, I love that idea.” (Well, King would say “dude.” That’s not Neil’s style.)
If you’ve got a calling to be important and artistic and literary, shit, dude, I applaud you. You’ll change the world. I am not making fun. This is how I feel. We need our Chestertons and Kerouacs and Eliots. We need people who push the envelope. We need people who lend relevance to the craft.
We also need the craft to remain popular. We need to bring money into it. It’s an underfunded craft. Without the pulps, there wouldn’t have been a climate where Jack London and Ernest Hemingway could survive. People wanted to read short form fiction, and sometimes they got tired of Burroughs and Howard and wanted something heavier.
These days, it’s all heavier. The industry is killing itself by its affluence. We might all be the next Kafka, but we should stop ALL of us TRYING to be the next Kafka. We should relax, write to say whatever’s in us, and let history sort out the chips.
And there should be more journals for people like me: people who may or may not have something “edgy” (ew) and “significant” (blah) to say, but who have a (possibly) entertaining way to say it. I’m tired of reading submission guidelines and deciding that my story about the chain-smoking, sailor-mouthed leprechaun house-breaker who lost his magic won’t fit their “let’s change the whole literary world” guidelines.
So…two ideas, maybe good ones, maybe not…
I hope that journals that describe themselves as “literary” will practice some consolidating. They’re all so similar, it would be amazing if they could share audiences and help themselves and their writers gain more exposure. Not sure how that would work, but I think it could work. That would be amazing.
And, second idea, I hope that we see an explosion of entertaining journals that publish short-form fiction — short stories and serials — that you’d be hard-pressed to describe as “literary” but that you’d happily describe as a rip-roaring good time.
I want my pulp mags. I want my Amazing Tales.
One final thought…
Did you get crushed by the bear?
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