WordWired: The connection for young creative characters

Great news for creative Aussie teenagers!

WordWired will be launching the aptly titled WordWired magazine in Term 4 this year. This magazine will offer teenage writers and artists a real opportunity to see their work in print. Young journalists and creative writers across Australia who post their work to the relevant section of the WordWired forum by the 31st of July 2011 will be considered for publication in the magazine. Budding journalists are welcome to contact me directly if they wish to discuss ideas for articles. All writers should feel free to post drafts or unfinished works so that they can receive advice from other young writers about how to edit and/or complete their piece. Early submissions will have a greater chance of being selected.

Teenage artists (including photographers) should email me if they would like to be added to the illustrations mailing list. As written works are selected, artists will be given a brief outline of the illustration required, and can submit works directly until a suitable web forum is designed.

Contributions from rural and remote areas are strongly encouraged.

Creators of selected works will be contacted to request personal and parental permission for publication. An editing process may also be requested. Please note that no user’s work will be published without permission. Writers will retain all rights to their works, while offering WordWired non-exclusive rights to publish the selected piece/s in an electronic and print format for the first edition of the magazine.

Writers who wish to continue using the forum to simply post and discuss works (without being considered for publication) are, of course, very welcome! If you are contacted to request permission for WordWired to publish your work, you just have to say no.

Various works are sought for the magazine.

• Creative writing pieces of all forms and styles, including short stories, poetry, and scripts.

• Personal stories, especially reflections on experiences in the recent natural disasters in Australia.

• Creative responses to this edition’s theme. WordWired is seeking both written and visually creative responses to the Oscar Wilde quote: “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars”.

• Interviews with anyone of interest to you. For example, you could interview an Aboriginal elder, someone who has achieved something remarkable, or someone who has been through an interesting experience. Consider who might be interesting to other teenage readers. If the person is interesting to you, that could be a good clue!

• Articles on anything that you believe may be of interest. This could include issues of relevance to your age group, including bullying, alcohol and drug use, keeping up with technology and fashions, and any current media hype. You might also wish to give your opinion on recent occurrences in your local community, or in local or world news.

• Reviews of films, books, performances and music releases. We will soon be distributing items to forum users for review, however any reviews of recently released or performed creative works are welcome.

If you have any particular suggestions for sections you would like to see in the magazine, please post these in the Magazine Suggestions forum.

Happy writing!

Jacinta Rosielle
WordWired Web Administrator & Editor
Email: jacinta@wordwired.com

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith is just one of a series of new books that are re-igniting interest in classic fiction. This zombified version of the Jane Austen novel was released last year, and was soon followed by Ben H. Winters’ Sense And Sensibility And Sea Monsters.

Now this re-modelling trend is hitting the teen market. Cora Harrison’s I Was Jane Austen’s Best Friend has recently been released in the U.S.

Alongside this release is House of Dead Maids, Clare B. Dunkle’s idea of how Heathcliff became the intense character of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights. Don’t expect the dark moods and sombre settings of the classic in this one. On Teenreads.com, Dunkle says, “It’s a horror story, with gray-skinned, eyeless ghosts and ghastly dead things that don’t look human any more. But the real monsters of my book are the same as the monsters of Wuthering Heights: the normal people, who stick together and feel no compassion for outcasts, not even if they’re only little children.”

Mmmm… Interesting books for our future book club, methinks!

Stephenie Meyer has not told Twilight fans an important piece of information about Bella; she has no hands.

The hands that cup the apple displayed on thousands of Twilight copies around the world do not really belong to Bella (of course!), but to Kimbra Hickey, a “parts model”. With no consideration of Bella’s feelings on the disclosure of her disability, Kimbra has been trying to capitalise on her handsome exposure on one of the world’s most popular books.

Kimbra, who also works as a massage therapist, would now like to try her hand at acting. Her attempts to gain popularity from the Twilight covers include telling strangers she sees reading the novel, and carrying around an apple for demonstration purposes.

More information at: Link

(Photograph of Jerry Robinson by Andrea Mohin of The New York Times)

At the age of 17, the creator of Batman’s nemesis, the Joker, got a rather lucky break. Wearing a jacket which he’d painted with his own comics, Jerry Robinson’s work was noticed by Bob Kane, Batman’s creator. Kane and Robinson struck up a conversation, and the next thing Robinson knew was he was being offered work on the Batman team.

Robinson began as an inker and eventually became the artist for the Batman newspaper strip. Now 88 years old, his life has included work as an artist, a writer and a comic-book historian. The many stories of Robinson’s illustrious career are collected in Jerry Robinson: Ambassador of Comics by N. C. Christopher Couch which was released in September.