There are 57 stairs from the first floor of the Arts and Humanities building to the third. I know this because I used to count them on the way up to my ENGL 419: Chapbook Production class. I would breathe and count. Breathe and count. Before breathing and counting became my ritual, I was a novice to the editing world. It wasn’t until I was inducted into that class that I became aware of the rigorous and time-consuming standards of the publishing selection process.
It was the Fall of 2022 and we were a small class of eight. It was our task to read, discuss, and ultimately narrow down over 70 manuscripts until we chose our top ten and five runner-ups. I was eager with anticipation to begin reading other people’s work, but soon almost all of my free hours were spent reading six 30-page manuscripts every week. Like clockwork, my roommate would find me glued to my seat at the kitchen table pouring over my laptop late into the evening. It was all-consuming. Flume Press’s Chapbook Contest was something I had never heard of until I decided to pursue my Literary Editing and Publishing (LEAP) Certificate. ENGL 419 was a part of the required classes and it felt like a privilege to read other people’s work. While it was equal parts exciting and daunting to be a part of the judgment process, I soon felt in over my head.
Not long into the class, I quickly became aware of a prerequisite I had managed to skirt by: ENGL 415. Also taught by Prof. Sarah Pape, it was a course all of my classmates had taken. In that prereq. class, they helped read and select submissions for Watershed Review, and were familiar with the selection process, even if it was on a smaller scale. Not to mention, some of my peers were veteran poetry readers and writers. But poetry was a genre I was still relatively new to. As I found myself feeling less and less qualified to have a say in what made the cut and what didn’t, the more my evening ritual on the way to class became apparent. This somewhat neurotic behavior was a way to focus on what I could control, while keeping my small inner critic at bay.
I wasn’t acutely aware that I was experiencing symptoms of Imposter Syndrome at the time, but I now know that I was. What helped was finding fellow peers who weren’t very familiar with poetry, and together we leaned into an internal metric system that was more intuitive when judging submissions. Despite this, there were some moments when I knew for certain I had struck gold. When I first read the manuscript for Alive, Today, Again! Poems and Essays from the Middlelands by Kimberly Ramos, which later became the first runner-up of the contest, I knew I wanted to hold it as a book in my hands. Little did I know, six months later, I would be.
For the first time ever, the ENGL 419 class was split into two semesters. For me and my small group of classmates, this was wildly exciting. When Spring of 2023 rolled around, our class had nearly doubled in size and those from the first semester had a unique opportunity. We discovered which manuscripts from the last semester we would ultimately be creating and publishing. As we were split into two separate editorial teams, with mine working on Ramos’s work, we quickly found ourselves enraptured in an ongoing and enlightening creative process. We were all tasked with cover design, creating mock interior layouts, and deliberating which student-made posts would be used for social media promotion. By the end of the semester, we were privileged to hand-sew 100 copies of Ramos’s work. I learned how to create a near-perfect fold as my peers and I hand-folded each page and cover of every chapbook.
Looking back at the Fall semester, where I didn’t feel fully qualified, I can now see that time period gave me the confidence to take on more responsibility in the Spring. The rigorous process of reading and selecting submissions to be published, and later the privilege of working with a team to produce one of those works as a chapbook, is an experience I’ll never forget. Engaging in the ENGL 419 class both semesters was an invaluable look at what it means to be a part of the Literary Editing and Publishing process. This class has given me the opportunity to meet some amazing people, to work closely with Ramos, and see design choices that I collaborated on come to life. It taught me the value of working together and the painstakingly tedious process of editing with Adobe InDesign. It gave me invaluable tools I can take with me to hone in my future career. These experiences have taught me that I am capable and that I can trust my intuition and my work. I feel confident going forward, and know that wherever life takes me, if my next job is on the third floor—it’s okay to count the stairs.
The LEAP Lab 