Continuing our ‘behind the scenes at the magazine’ series, for which Netflix has not yet bid, we have reached the start of reading month, roughly eight weeks before the issue is mailed out. From 1 September and 1 February, every submission is date-logged into an Excel chart with name, m/f/t if known (to keep tabs on gender balance), contact details, up to six poem titles and a column to add a biography if needed later.
In feedback, as with poems themselves, a light touch is usually more effective. I keep pencil marks faint, partly because they are just suggestions, and partly so that the poet can erase them with relish and re-use their copies if they wish. Before returning these annotations (hence the s.a.e. request) I scan and file them by surname and issue for quick retrieval. Word attachments from overseas I condense into fewer pages, to print out and read away from the screen. Any ‘scribbled musings’ I then scan and attach to an email response with the key points distilled. If the scanned pencil marks become even fainter, they at least show where there might be a query or concern for the poet to ponder.
This extends a few days past the month to allow for submissions posted in time but enjoying a Royal Mail mystery tour. From the accepted and provisionally accepted poems, colour-coded on the spreadsheet, I compile a 37-page A4 Word document which I convert, heading by heading, page by page, into a 64-page Adobe InDesign file, with placeholder text for biographies, editorial and end-matter in gestation. I save this artwork to a pdf from which I send 50 or so page proofs out for checking. Each correction is made as it comes in and the whole file successively re-saved.
By then I know the full issue fairly well and can write the editorial, which I hope – by tuning in to the media and poetry zeitgeist and relating those to current events (OK not this time) – will complement, rather than replicate, the contents. When I have done this, generated the new barcode, composed the back cover and sorted the front, I will ‘package’ an artwork folder for the printers. A few days later, fingers crossed, I will check and sign off the bound proof, and soon after that the boxes will sit, like a cubist pram, in the hall.
A beat. Next: the heavy lifting.
Pennine Platform 