Signing Contracts

Publishing is rife with contracts. From books, to essays, to articles--even poems and meditations--publishers large and small want to insure their rights and make the author sign on the dotted line.

I've signed quite a few of these documents of late. Most are one page contracts, easily readable, and are simply meant to insure that I've written original material and that I'm not plagiarizing or submitting previously published material. The contract also outlines the author's rights (usually assigning rights back to the author once the material is published first run in the magazine). Pay is mentioned, too. Although, in most cases, there is no money exchanging hands. At least, I rarely get any.

Yesterday I received payment for a poem that an editor in Ventura, California accepted for a Fall literary journal: a year's subscription to the journal itself. My first issue just arrived. I shelved it immediately and went back to writing. I now have a small library of these complimentary subscriptions. It seems one arrives about every week. But I'm not complaining. I get nice handwritten notes from the editors who tell me things like, "Loved this one!" or "You're the man!" or "Next time I read something this well written I'm sending you cool million."

But I'm not a legal eagle and contracts are not my bag. That's why I have an agent who handles my larger-mainstream book material. She reads all of this gobbledy-gook and tells me, "We won't sign this!" or "I'll ask the editor to make another offer" or "Let's hold out for a bucket of chicken gizzards and a pint of mashed potatoes." I love her for this. If not for her, I'd sign anything. Publishers would have my liver and one of my kidneys by now if not for her dedicated oversight of these contractual matters.

As for the small contracts for essays, articles, devotions, poems, columns, and humor--all of which I continue to write in great swelling masses--I'll sign at will. Essentially, I write for free. And the editors know it.

Next time I sign, however, I might make one concession. I wonder if I could work in a letter to my wife? The editor would be required to write her a personal letter on my behalf, telling her what a swell guy I am to work with, and how I have personally saved the magazine from extinction, and would she consider making love to her writer before he burns out?

Hey, it's worth a try.