Reprint rights?

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WhisperingBard

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I used to put out a quarterly childrens newsletter with an artist friend of mine. Subscriber base was just under 1000. During that time, some of the pieces I wrote (stories and poetry) also appeared on a corresponding web site.

I would like to polish up some of those pieces and submit them for print publication. I've done my homework and found appropriate markets that accept reprints.

I'm assuming that I *do* treat these as reprints, yes?

My question is, then, how do I address this in my cover letter? (The editors in question prefer to see full manuscripts, so I won't be sending queries.) Do I flat out say I'm offering reprint rights? Do I explain how and where the first publications occured?

Many thanks for any help.
 
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Tish Davidson

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I would say something in my cover letter like "In [date] a version of this piece appeared in [title] with a subscriber circulation of under 1,000 and was posted briefly on the newsletter's Web site." and let the editor figure out if he/she is interested. There is a big difference between reprint rights for something that has appeared in a large national circulation publication like Highlights for Children and a small circulation newsletter. Most editors are interested in whether their readers might have seen the piece elsewhere, so I would in as brief a way as possible tell the editor as much as you can about the degree to which the story circulated and let the editor make the call. I think stating you are offering reprint rights doesn't give enough information and might eliminate you from consideration automatically, when, in reality, with so small a circulation, an editor might not care. What you can't do is just ignore the fact that versions of these pieces have already been published.
 

writerinthesage

Question about Children's Newsletters

I was reading your posts about reprint rights. Please forgive me if I sound like an amateur with my question. I am networking with writers in my area to write articles for a children's newsletter that I want to make available for my daughter's elementary school. It would be four sheets, 8 pages long. I was under the assumption that I could not write for my own "publication" and maintain any level of credibility. Is this true? I see that in the posts for the reprint issue, that this might not be the case.

Thanks,
Ursula Stanton
 

WhisperingBard

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I was under the assumption that I could not write for my own "publication" and maintain any level of credibility.
I'm not quite sure how to answer your question because I think it depends entirely on the publication itself and your credentials. In my case, the newsletter was a vehicle for my writing and the artwork of the person I was working with. Our subscriber base knew us and our work before they signed up for our newsletter and, in fact, the newsletter resulted from their requests. So, our newsletter was strictly a vehicle for our works. I might add that we were in a niche market, too, and providing a service that just wasn't (and isn't) readily available to this subset of parents.
 
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