Ceris Aston

So when we had originally talked about the zine, I think we had thought, so Beth and I on this very first day, we talked about poetry simply because of the idea of a short form zine.

The sort of second time we talked about it with Trevor, we said, no, we want both.

I mean, we're all, Beth Karras and I all write somewhat, and I think we all move

Keris raises her disdainful eyebrow but I think we all move between the genres and don't see much of a boundary so there was that and there was also the recognition that I think a lot of people, this sounds remarkably cynical, a lot of people would read short stories where they wouldn't necessarily read poetry and so we wanted a balance and we wanted to try and reach people who like both of those things and

maybe tell people who read one of those things that they actually do like the other help them discover new gems yeah and it's also nice i suppose one of the things we're really keen on is um providing a space for new like writers emerging and many of whom

with different types of writing and things like that.

I think we try to be quite open and inclusive and also nice.

We've heard from so many people who maybe submit to us and even if we don't accept the poem, we do try our best to give good feedback.

And we give thought to our feedback.

I think my favourite thing was Finola Scott, who is an Edinburgh-based writer, and she came up to Stanza in March, where we had our first birthday party, and she came up and she was amazed that she had been accepted for Sartorial, where we said standards were really high, and we loved her piece and thought, how are you so surprised?

And she said it was one of the first things she'd submitted, I think, but that she'd been encouraged by Colin Will, who's also an Edinburgh-based writer,

because even if we don't accept things, we give good feedback.

And I thought, okay, that's the moment where all of these hours... That's wonderful.

Yeah, that's absolutely wonderful.

And I think as well, when people... We've had before emails from someone who's like, it's the first time I've ever submitted anything.

And sometimes we're able to sort of be like, well, well done, it's amazing, we're taking it.

Yeah.

I think my favourite thing isn't even that, it's when they then submit the next time you get in and it's sort of like having given that feedback and they've approached us again with another piece of work and we can just be like, yes.

Or sometimes we, I can't remember who it was now, but I think somebody wrote and they'd worked in the edit and submitted somewhere else and got it in.

That's so nice.