James Moore comes clean (for a split-second)

I was doing some late-night Canadian Heritage website surfing (I know, who doesn't?), when I came across this rambling personal message from Canadian Heritage minister James Moore. In the message he writes about the formation of the Canadian Periodical Fund and the recent flurry of discussion sparked by a National Post column on the Fund - it's pretty shocking stuff.

I had a feeling it wouldn't last long on the Canadian Heritage site (I was right, they've already pulled it down), so I copied the text and snapped some screenshots.

Click on the screenshots below to see the whole thing in its original context. I've also pasted the text below.

Screenshot 1 of 3 (click to expand)



Screenshot 2 of 3 (click to expand)



Screenshot 3 of 3 (click to expand)

Ok, fulltext:

The Honourable James Moore
Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages

Can’t you guys take a joke? I mean seriously, c’mon you guys

I know it’s late but I’ve had this bottled up inside for too long and I need to let it out.

First off, I love Canadian literary magazines. My perfect Saturday morning: green tea, Kenny G, Snuggie and the latest Malahat Review. So when Steve came to me and said "We need a new policy on magazine funding", I laughed. Then he laughed. It was fun. So I was like, "Let’s have even more fun with this" and I drafted up this crazy idea for a Canadian Periodical Fund that would give millions to Chatelaine and nothing to the Malahat or almost any of the other lit mags I love so much. I was all like "Hey big, commercial magazines that promote the mindless consumption of Ugg Boots and Spanx, here’s a bunch of money. And hey magazines that produce art and writing and stuff that we’re always really proud of once the artists get "big", here’s a swift kick in the butt on the way out the door!"

I totally thought everyone would get it, guys. To be safe, at the end where it said "you sign below to approve the creation of the Canadian Periodical Fund", I changed it to "NOT approve" with a pen – so it looked like I’d changed my mind at the last minute. I know, awesome, right? So then I faxed it over to Steve and was all like LMFAO on the cover letter. A couple weeks later, while I’m immersed in the rich meditations of A.F. Moritz in the new Fiddlehead, my secretary calls and tells me the CPF has gone through! Turns out the "NOT" was too faded on the fax, and Steve never saw it. D’OH!

So I was sort of trapped – I mean, how do you tell your boss that he missed the joke? Especially when your boss is this guy? So I kept quiet and played along. The only person I told was Bev Oda. We were sitting together in the Parliamentary cafeteria and when I told her, she shot milk out her nose. Then she ran off all excited, saying she wanted to "give it a try." Weird.

I figured that it would all work itself out – all the writers, publishers and editors in Canada would rally against the new CPF, and by the time the next election rolled around, Steve would have no choice but to back down. But then this thing came out in the National Post books section talking about how good the CPF is. And then a bunch of writers chimed in in support of killing lit mags. Maybe you all just forgot to add the "NOT", I dunno. But seriously, that’s messed up dudes.

So now what am I supposed to do? How can I in good conscience read Prairie Fire, knowing that it stands on the mutilated corpses of Grain and CV2? Man, even my metaphors are starting to go...

So here it is. The truth. It was a joke, people. A joke I played on the government. It’s not a big deal. We should all just have a good laugh and move on like nothing ever happened. No one should get mad at me or anything. Ok? So we’re good? Awesome!

See you in April (oh man... it’s 2 AM... it’s already April. Time for nappies!).

Yours,

Jimbo

Comrade!

While I got a few out there, I fell well short of compiling a book worth of poems for James Moore. I have a feeling that Stephen Brockwell and Stuart Ross will have more success with Stephen Harper.

Get writing quick and send your poems in for their Rogue Stimulus: The Stephen Harper Holiday Anthology. All the info is here.

Need inspiration? I figured this picture might help...

James Moore Rejection Letter

I recently received a rejection letter for my two poetry submissions to James Moore (read them here and here). I must admit that at first I wasn't sure it was a rejection (I've had this problem before). The main barrier to my comprehension was that the letter is chocked full of bureaucratic boilerplate (I mean, two pages? Wow!). I suppose this is to be expected when transitioning from running a political newsletter and website to running a literary arts journal. That said, they did manage to reject two submissions with one letter (Exhibit A, below), which is a veteran move.

I've posted their rejection letter below, along with my own annotation which will hopefully clear things up for you, the reader, and perhaps help the editors of James Moore's publications shorten up future letters (click to expand the images):
Section B) "Thank you for your submission."

Section C) "We received hundreds of excellent poems for consideration for our upcoming issue. Because of this, we weren't able to accept all the great work that was sent to us."

Section D) "Unfortunately, we have to reject your submission."

Section E) "But we still totally like you."
Section E continued) "No, seriously. We do."

Section F) "And we hope you keep submitting, though preferably somewhere else."

Section G) "Yours, The New Intern"

James Moore Letter #2

Well, it's been a few months and I haven't heard anything from James Moore about the poetry submission I mailed him. So, today I sent off a query letter:

[click on the image to expand]

If you aren't familiar with the issue, check out this update or this Facebook group, or both!

If others wish to send a similar poetry submission, direct it to:

James Moore, MP
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A6

And please, send a scan or photo of your submission to me at roblucastaylor(at)gmail.com, so that I can post it here.

Lastly, if you couldn't read the scan, here is the full text of my query letter:

James,

It’s been a few months and I haven’t heard from you in regards to my poem, “An Open Letter to James Moore, Minister of Cultural Heritage and Official Languages”, which I submitted for inclusion in your constituency newsletter or on www.jamesmoore.org.

I understand that you must be getting swamped with submissions. Most poets I know don’t even bother sending work out to traditional literary magazines anymore (they’ll probably fold before they get the next issue out!). If you haven’t yet managed to wade through the deluge and find my submission, that’s fine. But I figure it never hurts to check.

Also, I forgot to include a SASE with the submission. Maybe that’s the problem. I understand that budgets are tight everywhere, and it may be too costly for you to mail the reply (when automakers are only getting $4 billion in bailout money, you know times are tough!). So if that’s the case, I’ve attached a SASE with this letter.

While I’m at it, I figured I’d send you another poem. A companion piece of sorts for my first submission:


James Moore, Minister of Cultural Heritage and Official Languages, is just big boned

There was an MP from Port Moody
Whose waistline declared him a foody
He gobbled funding to Arts
Like a box of Pop Tarts
And left us a pile of doody.


Thank you in advance, yet again, for your consideration. If the policy that’s causing all these troubles is reversed, I think I’ll send this poem to The Malahat Review. For now, though, it’s yours. Enjoy!

Sincerely,

Rob Taylor

open letter to james moore update #2

A letter to James Moore from Hamilton poet Marilyn Gear Pilling, after my challenge for silly open letters/submissions to the Honourable Member. This one is not silly, sadly, but a darn good letter nonetheless:

To: James Moore, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages

Dear Minister,

I know that there have been protests about your intention to cut off government grants to magazines with a circulation of less than 5,000, which would be every literary magazine in Canada. I am not sure whether anyone has explained the reason for the outcry, that is, the relationship between these magazines and the ability to become a writer.

There was a time when I did not know anything about this relationship, and there is no reason why you would be expected to know it, given the breadth of your responsibilities. Therefore I've tried to summarize it in this short letter, and trust that you will then see the effect this proposed policy would have. I do hope your staff will bring this letter to your attention.

There are steps involved in becoming a successful, published writer, and as you will see the literary magazines are a crucial element. The following is over-simplified in the interests of brevity:

Step 1 - The writer's work (fiction or creative non fiction or poetry) appears in the literary magazines of this country. Even this step is not easy for an aspiring writer. The literary magazines can publish only two or three submissions out of every hundred they receive, due to limited space. Many fine pieces of writing receive multiple rejections at this level.

Step 2 - Having built up a publishing record in the literary magazines, (and it may take ten years to achieve ten or twelve published poems or stories), the writer sends a full length manuscript of work to the small, independently owned Canadian publishers. If the writer has built up a track record in the literary magazines, he or she is much more likely to have work at least considered and read by these small publishers. The writer has a chance that his or her work may be published as a book. As well, literary agents and larger publishers look at these magazines to see what new talent may be out there. Another benefit is that writers read these magazines. The first level of success and the first level of encouragement for a writer is that other writers, as well as the editors of the literary magazines, read the work, respond to it , may encourage it, and become familiar with the author. A writer needs this initial recognition to be able to continue.

Step 3 - Having had two or three books published by the small, independent publishers, the writer, typically, uses these books to attempt to interest a larger publisher, such as McClelland and Stewart or Knopf, in publishing the writer's work. These larger publishers have budgets for marketing the book, and at this point, the writer may develop a name and find that his or her work is being read by the general public.

Almost all of Canada's name authors have followed this route. A handful of writers, due to a combination of luck or material that expresses the zeitgeist or winning a big prize will jump from obscurity directly to a position where their work is read and known by the general public, but the vast majority work fulltime at another job and follow the route I have described, which is long and demands a great deal of persistence and many years of slogging in the trenches.

If you effectively remove the trenches, over 98% of Canada's aspiring, developing writers will never get off the ground. A good analogy is the disappearance of the wetlands, which scientists now know leads to the disappearance of entire species.

The amount of money the government expends to allow these literary magazines to exist is so small that removing it will do nothing to reduce the deficit. However, allowing these grants to continue will mean that Canada continues, over time, to produce writers like Michael Ondaatje, Alistair MacLeod, Carol Shields, Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Yann Martel - writers who are giants on the world stage and have resulted in Canadian literature proliferating and being studied and read and respected in many countries.

Of course, it is not only for the purpose of developing Canada's image abroad that it is important to assist writers in getting a start. The work they produce will enrich and deepen the lives of readers for years to come, and provide an important contribution to the nation's culture.

Yours truly,

Marilyn Gear Pilling
Hamilton, Ontario

open letter to james moore update

Zach Wells comments on the nonsense: "James Moore's Little Blue Choo-choo"

He also stirs up a bit of his own: "Open Letter to James Moore"

Daniela Elza comments on the nonsense: "doomed under 5000"

My original post can be read here.

An Open Letter to James Moore, Minister of Cultural Heritage and Official Languages

[New updates here and here]
[Read my follow-up query letter here]
[Read the government's rejection letter here]
[Quill and Quire blogs on the submissions here]


Well, I've finally gotten together a submission to James Moore, motivated by the proposed funding changes at Canadian Heritage that will kill off most literary magazines in Canada (if you don't know what I'm talking about, there's more info here, here, and here):

(click on the letter to expand it)

I had a false start in sending it off, choosing to deliver it in person to his constituency office in Port Moody instead of mailing it to Ottawa. The personal touch always helps with editors - or so I thought...

Alas! Theirs is not the literary wing of his operations. A good lesson for future submitters! My first submission was rejected thusly:

(click on the letter to expand it)

I've rebounded from this initial setback, as all determined artists must, and have resubmitted my poem to Mr. Moore's office in Ottawa. Hopefully there they will better appreciate the value of poetry in "Householder" mailouts - we all must open our minds to new possibilities if we are to survive the troubled times ahead! I will, of course, post here any response I receive.

If others wish to send similar submissions, please direct them to:

James Moore, MP
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A6

And please, send a scan or photo of your submission to me at roblucastaylor(at)gmail.com, so that I can post it here.

Lastly, here is the full text of my letter, in case the scans don't do it for you:

Mr. Moore,

I have written the following poem and am submitting it to you in hopes that you might publish it in your constituency newsletter or on www.jamesmoore.org. This request is part of my wider search to locate alternate publishing venues for my work, as I am preparing for every literary magazine in Canada to soon be shut down. The magazines will be closing, as you may know, due to some new government policy to cease funding magazines with circulation under 5,000. What will they come up with next, eh?

Anyway, Mr. Moore, here is the poem:

An Open Letter to James Moore, Minister of Cultural Heritage and Official Languages

You’re a few bricks short, a ten-second minute,
You’ve got a nice house, but there’s nobody in it.
You’re as thick as molasses, as sharp as a ball,
Your car’s cylinders just won’t fire at all.
You’ve got bats in your belfry, air in your head,
Your infinite monkeys are infinite dead.
I bring you this message as a citizen, friend:
James, your little blue choo-choo has wound ’round the bend.

Thank you in advance for your consideration. Obviously, if the government policy were to be reversed, I would immediately withdraw my request for publication.

Yours,

Rob Taylor