Glenn Ingersoll listing at Poets & Writers

Check out my listing at Poets & Writers: Glenn Ingersoll

Currently it’s pretty bare. No bio yet. Maybe tomorrow …

I’ve thought about having a listing at Poets & Writers since I found out there was such a thing. Years and years ago. 

Once I even  put together an application packet. I think this was before the internet, when you were required to send pages photocopied from magazines. I never submitted it. I’m not sure why. 

Or, wait, was there a Poets & Writers directory pre-internet? I'm not sure. In the internet’s early days P&W could still have wanted the supporting documents hard copy. Literary culture hadn’t exploded online. Few literary magazines had a web presence, let alone posted poems or stories.  

I am self-conscious about this sort of thing. Self-promotion vs. letting the work speak for itself. Maybe I didn’t finish the application process because I didn’t feel worthy. Maybe I was afraid the editors would reject the application because the magazines in which my poems had been published were too obscure. Maybe I was afraid that I would expect a listing to have some meaning, some consequence. If I got a listing and nothing came of it, nobody wrote, nobody called — would that hurt my feelings? Or was following through just too much bother? Not worth the cost of postage? Might there have been a charge to be listed back then?

This spring, what with the covid shutdown and the things-to-do list getting a few line-throughs, I looked up the latest version of the directory application. Like I said, I’ve thought about getting listed for years. The application has been made easy. If your stuff is up online — and the venue is one P&W officially recognizes (not “too obscure” or too vanity-press) — you just upload a link. Six links are required. The P&W directory editors review the application, then add your name to their database (or, I guess, don’t). 

Once you’re in you can expand the listing with author photo and bio. I see there’s even an option to link to video. 

If you have any suggestions for improving the listing, leave me a note in comments below. Or send me an email.