BETHANY CLANCY and AMBER MATTICE
Staff Writer and Life & Arts Editor
The Trident, Fredonia’s own student-run literary magazine, was officially released on April 25.
The English Department’s literary publishing class, taught this semester by Eric Neuenfeldt and Josh Kalscheur, has been working on the publication since the beginning of the semester.
For poetry submissions, the class had about 15 writers submit up to three poems at a time. Furthermore, there were 11 writers who submitted prose pieces which ranged from 1,000–2,000 words each.
“Each writer remained anonymous to the class’ editing and publishing team to eliminate selection bias,” said Matt Shea, a junior social work major.
Because they had to keep the page length in mind, The Trident is composed of three prose pieces and 10 poems, making it 22 pages long.
The process of getting the published final product was not an easy one for many of the students.
“In the beginning of the semester, it was hectic, and there was a general worry that we wouldn’t meet our deadlines on time. That was mostly due to the fact that our class was huge and it’s generally hard to get that many people to agree on anything. However, we dealt with that by splitting into smaller groups, allowing us to approach our goals without any conflict,” said Kerrin Richards, a senior visual arts and new media major.
The publishing class held their launch parties on April 25, with various groups of students leading individual events across campus from 5-6:45 p.m. Open mics and readings were held at each location to celebrate the work of the students involved.
“The Release Part[ies] really summed up the experience. All of us coming together to celebrate the creative minds in Fredonia,” said sophomore animation/illustration major Michaela Ruggiero.
The class described the release parties as a “lit-crawl,” as each group was required to go from one party to the next as the evening progressed.
Shea’s group held an open mic in the amphitheater where the writers of each piece were able to read aloud their submissions if they so pleased. Audience members were allowed to share their own pieces as well.
He said that it was a great way to unify writers and literature under one student body. He even had a special visitor from Daemen University in Buffalo to listen. She was also very pleased with this years creativity and seemed to thoroughly enjoy the event.
When talking about the event and The Trident overall, Shea said, “All in all, I could encapsulate this year’s event by saying there is no status quo in literary expression.”
At each release party, copies of The Trident were available for students to take and read along with those performing.
In the lobby of Rockefeller Arts Center, a group of the publishing students gathered and read erasure poems, which are poems made from isolated lines of another poem or short story. Many of those who had work featured in the magazine were present to read.
Overall, many felt that it was the perfect way to end a semester’s worth of hard work, and several students are glad to be able to hold the finished product in their hands.
“It feels surreal now that we’re done,” said junior dual software development and engineering major Elijah Weyant. “We put so much time into it, and I never felt like we would actually be done until all of a sudden we were, and now it’s just slightly empty. But it’s like watching an old friend move on to larger things in life, bittersweet.”