NESCBWI Conference: Jane Yolen
NESCBWI Conference: Keynote Speeches
The NESCBWI Annual Conference (held this past weekend) featured an incredible list of keynote speakers: Jane Yolen, Lin Oliver, Tomie dePaola, Steve Mooser, and Harold Underdown. I’ve recapped some of the highlights from Jane’s, Tomie’s, and Harold’s speeches below. (Disclaimer: All of the speeches were great, but for the sake of brevity, I am focusing on the ones that were most relevant to my blog.)
JANE YOLEN
Author Jane Yolen talked about “the dreaded rejection letter.” Despite the seemingly depressing topic, Jane’s speech was very inspirational. It was amazing to hear that Jane still receives rejections on her manuscripts, even at this stage in her incredibly successful career!
Jane told us that one of her most well known books, Owl Moon, was rejected five times before it was published. Her adult poetry was rejected 113 times before it was finally accepted on its 114th submission! Not that I am happy to hear about her struggle, but it does give us newbies some hope :-).
The bottom line: Publishing is a subjective business, and manuscript selection depends at least partly on the economy and on marketing prospects for a particular story. Take rejection with a grain of salt, keep creating, and keep submitting!
