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Far from me be the wild expectation that every author will not habitually measure the merits of a periodical by its appreciation of his or her last manuscript (1).
T. W. Higginson
"Letter to a Young Contributor," 1862
Editor: a person whose business it is to separate the wheat from the chaff, and to see that the chaff is printed (2)
.
Adlai Stevenson, 1965
IN APRIL OF 1862, a few months before he assumed command of the First (Black) South Carolina Volunteers of the Union Army, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, an editor of The Atlantic Monthly, published perhaps the most fruitful letter of advice ever written by an editor, "Letter to a Young Contributor." Convinced that "To take the lead in bringing forward a new genius is as fascinating a privilege as ... of having been the first man to discover the Asiatic cholera," Higginson offered an open hand to new talent. He explained the interlocking roles of editor and contributor, certain that most of his journal’s readers either "might, would, could, or should be The Atlantic Monthly’s contributors (1)
." One of those who "might, would, could, or should" was the young, unpublished Emily Dickinson, who responded to the letter by submitting a few poems—and the rest is literary history. It is in that spirit that this letter is addressed to you, who might, would, could, or should become a contributor to The FASEB Journal.
EDITING THE FASEB JOURNAL
It’s just over a year now since a new editorial board assumed responsibility for The FASEB Journal, and we’d like to share that experience with you. Last July, we changed our practice of printing part of our content in short versions of fuller manuscripts available on-line (FJ Express). We have now reverted to the classic model of a research journal that prints only complete articles (with e-publication on acceptance after full review). Thanks to this switch, a sparkling staff, an active, internationally-known editorial board, and a legion of devoted reviewers, both the kinetics and demographics of The FASEB Journal have changed.
Continuing a trend developed by our predecessors, we now receive over 2000 submissions a year (vs. 488 in 2003). We’ve also shortened the turnaround time between first submission and acceptance to 65 days (vs. 106 days in 2003). In consequence, the bar to publication has been raised: we now accept fewer than 10% of papers submitted. This barrier has caused no little dismay, and elicited many comments along the lines of Adlai Stevenson’s quip. Since careers in science are not based on experiments done, but on experiments published, it’s a sad moment for contributor and editor alike when work is rejected. But as Higginson advised,
In the treatment of every contributor the real interests of editor and writer are absolutely the same, and any antagonism is merely traditional... No editor can ever afford the rejection of a good thing, and no author the publication of a bad one (1)
Much of what any journal turns down happens to be very good work. It is the product of the latest techniques, the highest of aims, the most intricate work. However, the object of intricate science is not the exhibition of intricacy, but its result. "You do not put guano on your garden that your garden may blossom guano (1)
."
EDITING WITHOUT BORDERS
As a young contributor, you are likely to work outside the United States; the web sends us good science from every corner of the globe. Experimental biology seems to be a highly contagious disease. In 2006, The FASEB Journal received contributions from 59 countries, including the Congo, Cote Ivoire, Iran, Kyrgystan, Serbia and Montenegro, Sudan, Usbekistan, and Vanuatu (Table 1
). Yes, Vanuata, the Francophone paradise of the South Pacific.
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Whereas papers from USA constituted a plurality, papers from abroad made up the majority submitted to The FASEB Journal. No surprise there: in fact, the geographic distribution of papers we receive reflects closely the universe of scientific publications. The latest (2004) world-wide survey of "reputable scientific journals" also showed Europe in the lead with 38% of total papers published. The United States was at 33%, while the Asia Pacific region yielded 25% (3)
. We might add that submission:acceptance ratios for The FASEB Journal were essentially the same for each region.
We may cast a wide global net today, but the editorial principles that guide this publication are those the same that guided Higginson of The Atlantic Monthly in the days when the U.S. was a distant outpost of art and science.
EDITING THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY
Tough-minded as well as generous, Higginson had addressed his "Letter to a Young Contributor" not only to potential authors, but also to those whose work he had rejected. Then, as now, authors often responded violently to critical comments, and Higginson penned his Letter as "one comprehensive reply in print" to the individual grumbles and groans of those turned down. Admitting that chance and error were part of the process ("People criticize higher than they attain"), he reverted to biology in describing the tough decisions an editor must make:
His time has some value, if yours has not; and he has therefore educated his eye till it has become microscopic, like a naturalist’s, and can classify nine out of ten specimens by one glance at a scale or a feather. Fancy an ambitious echinoderm claiming a private interview with Agassiz, to demonstrate by verbal arguments that he is a mollusk! (1)
Nowadays we’d call that setting "editorial priority." Few rejected authors, however, could respond to critics in quite the manner of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, another Atlantic author, who blasted the whole tribe:
What a blessed thing it is that Nature, when she invented, manufactured, and patented her authors, contrived to make critics out of the chips that were left (4)
Higginson tried to resolve the traditional needs of authors for leniency and editors for excellence:
An editor thus shows himself to be but human; and it is well enough to remember this fact, when you approach him. He is not a gloomy despot, no ruler of the underworld, but a bland and virtuous man, exceedingly anxious to secure plenty of good subscribers and contributors, and very ready to perform any acts of kindness not inconsistent with this grand design (1)
EDITING A GENIUS
Emily Dickinson was responsive to both sides of Higginson’s editorial persona: the tough and the generous. In the summer of 1862, she responded to Higginson’s letter by tentatively offering a few poems, asking:
Are you too deeply occupied to say if my verse is alive? The mind is so near itself it cannot see distinctly, and I have none to ask (5)
Thus began a 23-year long correspondence in the course of which Dickinson placed herself under the editorial tutelage of her "preceptor."
The poet could not have found a more suitable mentor. An early abolitionist and feminist, Higginson had a few years earlier championed women’s rights in an essay entitled "Ought Women to Learn the Alphabet?" Arguing for the equal education of women, he scored a point that remains half right today:
Like Charles Lamb, who atoned for coming late to the office in the morning by going away early in the afternoon, we have first, half educated women, and then, to restore the balance, only half paid them (6)
In time, a bond was established between poet and editor, a bond maintained by letters at long distance; in 1863 her letters were relayed to a battlefield cot where Higginson lay wounded. There were but two short face-to-face encounters between the two, the real tie was that of author and editor. The goal was excellence, not publication, of the work. Higginson recalled Emily’s response to his specific suggestions:
I remember to have ventured on some criticism which she afterwards called "surgery," and on some questions, part of which she evaded.
Dickinson replied to her preceptor:
Thank you for the surgery; it was not so painful as I supposed... Men do not call the surgeon to commend the bone, but to set it, sir (5)
In their correspondence, Higginson cautioned Dickinson against publishing, until her "irregularities" had been smoothed over. Diffident as ever, Dickinson protested:
I smile when you suggest that I delay "to publish," that being foreign to my thought as firmament to fin (5)
So far was she from firmament, that Dickinson never published more than seven poems (anonymously) in her lifetime. We owe it to Higginson himself that the bulk of Dickinson’s poems eventually saw the light of day in a posthumous volume edited by Higginson and Mabel Loomis Todd (7)
. Dickinson perished before she published. Immortality came later.
PUBLISH OR PERISH
Since science is not poetry, nor vice versa, the Higginson–Dickinson relationship would seem to offer no parallel in the world of scientific publishing. But Higginson’s approach to the poet’s irregularities are a sure guide to good thought and good science. Higginson’s comment on the poet sums up the process of writing scientific, no less than belletristic prose:
It would seem that at first I tried a little,—a very little— to lead her in the direction of rules and traditions; but I fear it was only perfunctory, and that she interested me more in her—so to speak—unregenerate condition. Still, she recognizes the endeavor. In this case, as will be seen, I called her attention to the fact that while she took pains to correct the spelling of a word, she was utterly careless of greater irregularities (5)
When your manuscript arrives in its "unregenerate condition" it will be welcome and balanced against the 150 or so others that are under review at any one time. We know that your career depends on solid, peer-reviewed contributions to science and that it’s our job to see that you get a fair shake. As editors and reviewers we will be interested not only in the nitty-gritty of your "correct spelling of a word" (internal consistency, the IC 50’s, the buffers, the pH, the purity of the cell line, etc.) but also the "greater irregularities" (Is the work new? Is it important? Does it open any doors?) In Higginson’s terms: we are not interested in the guano, but its result—a blooming garden. Welcome aboard, young contributor.
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FOOTNOTES
Images: Left: Emily Dickinson (1830-1886). Photo provided by Amherst College Archives and Collections. Printed by permission of the Trustees of Amherst College. Right: Thomas Wentworth Higginson (1823-1911). Photo courtesy of a private collection.
REFERENCES
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