We are now open, from 13th-22nd November, for Submissions for 2020’s 12 Days Of… Christmas feature! Please email us with your name and Christmas in the subject line.
General Submissions remain closed until December (Date TBC)
PLEASE OH, PLEASE, READ THESE CAREFULLY… AND PLEASE SEE THE NOTES REGARDING THE NEW GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE.
1. We ONLY accept submissions by email.
2. Send your submission of no more and no less than 4-6 pieces of work to Helen Ivory at inksweatandtearssubmissions@gmail.com and include YOUR NAME in the subject line. [please cut and paste email address – it’s a spam avoidance technique…]
3. Please include a short biographical note – 30-to-40 words max – about yourself in the THIRD PERSON. You may include links to publications or your blog or your website. Max 2 links. If your publication is available from Amazon UK we will provide a link to it on that site. (For further details see the Amazon Associates page.)
We also ask that you Like/Follow us on Facebook (@InkSweatandTears) or Twitter (@InkSweatTears) if you use social media. If we have a Twitter @username for you, we will automatically ‘mention’ it when we tweet about your work. We will also tag you in our Facebook posts if we can and that is much easier if you follow us.
In addition we will occasionally publish excerpts on Instagram (@insta.inksweatandtears) so please do let us know if you have an Instagram account.
Please let us know if you DO NOT want us to do any of this in regards to social media.
4. Your submissions can be within the body of the email or as pasted into a single Word document. If you are sending a graphic, including haiga, then PDF and JPEG files are fine.
5. Please note the maximum word length we will publish is 750 words.
6. Please DO NOT submit work that includes copyright material (such as pictures) belonging to other people/third parties unless you can supply us with written authorisation by that person/third party.
7. As the author you retain full copyright in your work. By submitting a piece of prose or poetry to us, you are merely granting IS&T a non-exclusive right (or ‘bare licence’) to reproduce your work.
8. Please note that, because of the number of submissions we receive, we can no longer accept work that has been previously published or is about to be published elsewhere; this includes personal blogs and Facebook. If, after accepting or publishing a work on IS&T, we find it published elsewhere on an earlier date, we will remove it from our web site. (We would also be very grateful if you could keep from posting your works elsewhere after IS&T publication, at least until we have decided on our Pick of the Month shortlist for the relevant month.)
The only exception to this rule is when we are asking for seasonal submissions to our annual 12 Days of Christmas feature or for our week long National Poetry Day feature in October.
9. No simultaneous submission please (and that includes work also being submitted to competitions) if only because it causes us unnecessary kerfuffle when, having accepted a piece, the author then gets it accepted elsewhere and wants to unsubmit it to us – or else even asks us to delete from the webzine a piece we have already published.
10. While nothing is sacred – and we will consider ‘political/current affairs’ contributions – we do reserve the right to reject any submission we feel is deliberately offensive or actionable.
11. We do not pay for submissions – we have no money.
12. Please, if your work is accepted, allow at least six months to pass before you send us more work for consideration.
13. And finally, please be patient, it’s just me (Helen) here reading all of the submissions. I normally try to get back to you within ten weeks. There is currently a three month waiting time between work being accepted, and it being published.
And PS – Once we have accepted your work, please do not send us edits or biography updates unless we have asked for them. This is very time-consuming and very difficult to keep track of.
PPS – Sorry this list is so long!
Reviews
We have no resident reviewers but are pleased to accept unsolicited reviews for poetry and short story collections. The guideline word-count for a full collection is 700 words, for a pamphlet, 500 words. All relevant submission guidelines from the list above also apply to review submissions.
Please do not send us reviews that have been published elsewhere, or will be in the future.
GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
GDPR is an EU Privacy Law that comes into effect on 25th May 2018.
Any organisation collecting, changing, transmitting, erasing, or otherwise using or storing the personal data of EU citizens will need to comply with the GDPR.
By submitting to Ink Sweat & Tears, you allow us to contact you with regards to our acceptance or non-acceptance of your submission. If we do not choose to publish it, your contact details will be deleted (unless you have already agreed to remain on our Contacts list.) If your submission is accepted we will sent details of it and your email to our administrative address – inksweatandtears@aol.com – where these will only be used regarding that submission, for example, if you have been shortlisted for Pick of the Month or if we have to reschedule you.
At this point we may write you and ask if you want to be included on our permanent Contacts list. We will then need your explicit written consent to store and use your email and will only use it to circulate specific kinds of information.
(A) If, as a winner of, or shortlisted for, Pick of the Month, we are considering your poem as a Forward Prize Submission.
(B) with details of discounts or offers on our IS&T pamphlets and with news of our Pamphlet Commission Competition – less than once a month.
You may choose to opt out of (B) but be assured that all group emails will be sent BCC and others will not have access to your address. (The only people to have access to those details will be editor Helen Ivory and publisher Kate Birch.) If anyone gets in touch with us wishing to contact you we will always pass on their address to you and will never share your details with third parties.
You may ask to be removed from our Contacts list at any time.