In February, Room opened for Issue 48.4. We asked you to take risks for this unthemed issue and named our topics of interest: urgency, complicity, past & present, Afrosurrealism, Indigenous futurism, a free Palestine, & more. Our issue editors, Sadie Graham, natasha gauthier, and Chimedum Ohaegbu chat about the issue, Room‘s 50th Anniversary, advice on submitting and being an editor, and more.
Issue 48.4 is unthemed—so, from the writers’ perspective, anything goes. But then what does it mean for the editorial team once you’re into the selection process?
SG: Without setting a theme for writers to submit toward, we definitely have to go into the reading process open to the universe. The theme will develop out of what we’re reading, what we’re accepting. We receive a huge number of submissions from all over. And what’s interesting is the similarities, the tendencies, that emerge when you look at them as a whole, like tracks across a field, some of which are trod and retrod, becoming paths, as many together yet independently pursue a line of thinking that we the editors can recognize as a collective concern. Without prompting or prescription, what are feminist writers writing about right now? What seem to be our most pressing interests, our stickiest preoccupations?
As I read, I’m guided by a feeling of responsibility to assemble an issue that looks clearly and directly at our present moment: the rising nationalism, rising temperatures, the repression of writers and academics speaking about Palestine, Canada’s complicity in Israel’s violence. When the status quo is silence, a writer has the power of speech, and an editor has the power of publication. I’m not sure it’s a lot of power, but it’s some.
ng: I’ve found with unthemed issues that themes naturally develop as we begin to find pieces that are speaking to us—some of these may feel urgent, or capture the zeitgeist of our times, some may speak to us through form or tone or sound, some may feel exciting and surprising in some way—but a constellation begins to develop, a shape begins to form, and we start to notice where there are similarities or contrasts and work to deepen that shape through selection. Each stage of the selection process is exciting, but I find a real energy begins to build once we can see the shape of the issue. Lots of editorial endorphins and dopamine flowing then.
What does Room’s 50th anniversary mean to you, and to 48.4?
SG: It’s never been more important for principled, feminist writing to be published in Canada. And I think it’s also true that in the last fifty years, it has never been any less important; that is, the writing that Room publishes has always been urgently needed. Room writers answer the questions of the time, and question the answers of the time, as well. That’s what we want to do.
ng: I think it can feel counterintuitive to celebrate as so many devastating things are unfolding in the world, but celebrating our past reminds us that there will be a future, it gives us hope. It’s also so important to acknowledge the work that’s gone into opening doors for marginalized voices, to celebrate those that blazed the trail, and those that continue to do the work, unapologetically taking up space and turning up the volume on the voices we so desperately need to hear now and always. I’m deeply honoured and incredibly proud to be part of Room as we celebrate 50 years of this important work, and I’m grateful I can contribute in my own small way with curating some of those voices for 48.4.
CO: It means stewardship. Room began publishing at a time when the landscape for feminist magazines in so-called Canada was more robust; we used to have a lot more peers, who fell away as funding and politics shifted. It’d be ideal if we were celebrating our 50th alongside, say, Fireweed Magazine. It makes Room’s survival ever more precious and necessary. The fact that we now have our feet under us from our decades of experience means that Room is now, more than before, a space to launch, maintain, and tend to the advocacy and artistry of feminist writers in today’s chilling political climate. I’m honoured to be here, and grateful—as a writer, editor, reader, and feminist—that Room Magazine persisted for as long as it has, and will, hope willing, for another 50 years.
What advice would you give to someone submitting to Room?
SG: Edit, edit, edit. Think hard about how you begin and how you end. Ask yourself if you’re avoiding something, and then dig in there.
ng: Really have to second Sadie here. Revision is so important. And get other eyes on your work to catch what you may have missed. But definitely send work in! You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.
CO: My number one piece of advice is to read Room! It’s a great way to get a sense of what we’re looking for, what we’ve published before, what we may find delightfully surprising. Also: if you can, read your work out loud before submitting, to yourself or a friend. It helps you catch unintended oddities—or expand on them if you please!
What have you recently read and loved?
ng: I’ve been reading a lot more poetry for my thesis, and I’ve been loving Poem That Never Ends by Silvina López Medin. There are these beautiful reflections/meditations on what it is to be a woman, a creator, a seamstress, a mother. I’ve been obsessed with these themes—the stitches and marks we make in our lives, the call to make them, and the idea of passing all this glimmering knowledge down through our fingertips—this language constructed of needles and threads. And the photographs and ephemera in this collection are just as dazzling. I’ll be reading these poems for years to come.
CO: I recently finished Kaveh Akbar’s Martyr!, which was tender and funny and hard and so surprising. I love a book that makes good use of dreams, that dips into the past to complicate the present, that works with beautiful language and even lingers in it without wallowing. Martyr! has it all.
SG: I’ve been reading Middlemarch for the first time—the relationship between reasonable Celia and her devout sister Dorothea is so lovely and funny. Early on, Eliot writes that Celia “had an indirect mode of making her negative wisdom tell upon Dorothea, and calling her down from her rhapsodic mood by reminding her that people were staring, not listening.” I (and I think most feminists) can relate! I also recently revisited “Customs / Psychological,” a short story by Angelo Hernandez Sias in the Drift, about a man detained at an airport, about surveillance, power, and girlfriends. It’s formally interesting, grounded and real, funny and awful. And in the most recent issue of Lux magazine, Leila Markosian’s essay “All Talk, No Action” about the “dialogue” industry that has been mobilized against student protestors and her experience at CUNY is a brilliant piece of criticism.
What about advice for anyone who would like to become an editor?
ng: Read widely (for real, though). Volunteer as a reader wherever you can get your foot in the door, and you’ll figure out what you enjoy editing, what you’d like more experience with, and what you don’t want to give your energy to. Go to writing events. Meet people who are doing what you want to do, and build reciprocal relationships. When you do get the job, think about how you like to be treated when accepting or declining work, or dealing with people in general. I think being empathetic and encouraging and building community is more important than ever, and it seems like it’s becoming more the standard with a lot of publications, which is sweet to see.
SG: I 100% agree with all of that. I think it can feel like there is a huge barrier to entry if you didn’t edit your undergraduate journal, or get a certificate, or do a workshop, if you don’t know anybody yet, if you didn’t start publishing in your twenties. And it feels that way because that’s how it is. You’re not imagining it. But you can be strategic, you can lay the tracks you need, build as you go. I started out doing a bit of web editing for SAD Magazine after I cold pitched and published a review on the site. Then I joined the editorial collective here at Room. Room’s emphasis on growth and mentorship means you can shadow the production of an issue, then support as an assistant editor, and finally lead one yourself. Members of the editorial collective do it all: read submissions, interview authors, proofread issues before they go to print. Being a first reader at a magazine will teach you more about your own writing and taste than almost any other activity you could dedicate 10 hours a week to, by volume alone.
