Hi there! My name is Fay Roberts, and I’m the founder of Allographic Press, which has been running since August 2011.
In this post, I’ll be telling you a bit about Allographic, about the new initiative we’re launching this week, and how you can submit work to the next anthology.
And if this is all a bit much to read, we have a simplified checklist here.
About Allographic
Allographic’s founding aim, and continuing mission, is to platform the voices less heard, raising marginalised stories into mainstream view as much as possible. So far we’ve mostly achieved that through open mic guest artists, hosting special performances, supporting the Other Voices show at Edinburgh Fringe (intersectional feminist spoken word cabaret), and focusing mostly on publishing single collections by people of marginalised identities.
New Venture
Now we want to go a step further, bringing back the Small Word anthologies we used to do, and theming them for a variety of experiences less explicitly well-represented on the publishing scene in the UK. The initial plan is for them to come out quarterly, in limited runs of 100 printed copies of A6 pamphlets, plus using ebook technology on a variety of platforms, to make the work more accessible. Please follow this blog and our various social media outlets, for news of the anthologies as they come up.
Submit to the anthology
So, to kick off, we’ll be producing an anthology based around the notion of neurodiversity – whether that’s autism, ADD/ADHD, synaesthesia, dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia, hyperlexia, Tourette’s Syndrome, or any of the other experiences that sit under the banner of neurodivergence – we want to publish your poems, stories, essays, photos, and original artwork (though please note that the latter two will be in black-and-white in the print versions). Please note that, for the purposes of this publication, self-diagnosis is perfectly valid as a basis for writing about the experience of neurodivergence. The working title for the anthology is currently Synaptic Resonance, but we’re definitely open to alternatives if you come up with something better!
Submit via this form.
Timelines
The deadline for submission is 28-Feb-23; we’ll be closing the form at midnight on 1-Mar-23 (GMT), with an aim to publish at the beginning of April 2023, with an online launch event shortly afterwards. It’s free to enter, and, if your work is selected, you’ll receive a free copy of the printed pamphlet and ebook. As with all these themed anthologies, we’ll be asking about your personal connection to the theme, as we’ll be prioritising selecting the work of folk who are neurodivergent themselves in this instance. The limit on entries is 3 pieces, with no limit on length (though we may reserve the right to publish an excerpt with a link to the full version online, especially for essays/ stories, etc.), and each piece must be submitted in its own separate file (see form for details – MS Word, ODT, and RTF files are fine, ditto PNG and JPG for artwork, but no pdfs). If you submit more than one piece per file, we will ignore anything beyond the first piece. Please note that for poetry and prose we are after pieces that are completely or mostly written in the English language, as we currently do not have the means to proofread other languages beyond Google Translate! You should hear within two weeks of the closing date whether your piece has been selected. Please note that we do not have the capacity to give feedback on individual pieces at this time, and we will not be accepting unsolicited manuscripts, or submissions via any means but the form provided, mostly because we’re a tiny team and there have to be some limits!
Please note that, if you want to ensure that we experience your poems (especially concrete poems) in the format/ layout you intend them, it will be best to download our template and submit your files based on that.
If your images include text, please try to use the Verdana font, as that’s what we’ll be using, for the sake of accessibility and consistency. Likewise, we’ll be asking you to supply image descriptions for any visual work you submit so that we can embed that in the ebook versions to improve accessibility.
Conclusion
So, talk to us about the trials and tribulations of communication and executive dysfunction; the joys and marvels of a brain that sparkles in dark places and sees the usual rules as guidelines at best. We want to hear everything, from across the spectrum (yep, we went there) of experience.
We look forward to seeing what you’ve got for us!
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| Image from a blog post from Hult Business School, entitled Thinking differently: Researching neurodiversity in the workplace |
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