Submissions are closed! As of midnight, March 22, Lincoln East’s Creative Writing Club received all eligible short stories, poems, photos, and art pieces to be reviewed for print in its annual literary magazine, The Muse. Excited with the increase in submissions since last year, the club is now moving to the second phase of production: deciding what will make it to print.
“I’m glad I get to submit my work somewhere,” an anonymous student said. “Even if it doesn’t get published, it’s still a really fun thing to do.”
With a grand total of 132 submissions – an increase of 55 more than last year’s edition – the club has split itself into four groups: one for each submission category to take on the job of reviewing all related works. The club has also added a new nickname system where all applicants are given aliases to prevent bias or accidental favoritism towards one creator.
“We’re using a nickname system so we don’t know whose is whose, but we know if they belong to the same person,” Abby Bagley, Creative Writing Club member, said. “So we don’t choose [too much] of one person’s.”
Submitted works aren’t judged by theme or content, but by quality, and whether or not the piece would fit within the limited number of pages the club can fill without excluding too many others.
“It’s not personal, we made sure it’s not,” Bagley said. “But we don’t have that much money, so we can’t put everybody in. But thank you.”
The club’s current goal date to release The Muse to the school is Monday, May 13. Students can look forward to that time to get to read the publication, and those whose work will be accepted can look forward to seeing their efforts in print.
