I'm being published!

As I have recently announced, a play that I wrote earlier this year is going to be published. For those of you who haven't been in direct contact with me to hear the whole story as it's developed, here's the basic plotline of how all of this came to be:

1. The story begins in my sophomore year, when I took Dr. Schwartz's Classical Philosophy course. I always suspected I loved Plato, but I didn't really know it until then. As Dr. Schwartz was skillfully explaining the cave allegory, he off handedly said: "It would be neat if we could perform this in the Dell (our college's outdoor Greek theater)". Being bright eyed and bushy tailed, I wrote this down immediately, and started playing with the idea of staging such an event in the future.

2. Senior year roles around and I need a senior project. I start out by looking into the archaeology of Greek theater spaces, but soon lose interest and voice to Dr. Cohen my now 2-year-old idea to turn Plato's philosophy into something that could be shown in the Dell. She bravely agrees to let me attempt a creative project for my senior project.

3. As the year progresses, my project begins to take form and becomes a full-formed play based on the trial and execution of Socrates modelled after the Old Comedy of Aristophanes that expresses the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, discussing mostly philosophy of drama and justice. I write a 50 page play complete with a 20 page commentary citing everything imaginable, from verses of Plato to explanations of Athenian democracy.

At this point, all I really hope for is that my professors will be satisfied that I made a creative project academically relavent and let me graduate with my BA in Classics.

4. Everything after that snowballed, in an incredible way. Dr. Cohen and Dr. Stevens (my Classics professors) were in fact so pleased with my project that they not only granted me an A but also submitted for consideration for the college's Best Senior Paper award.

5. In the meantime, I also have the delight of seeing part of the play performed for the future cast of Dr. Cohen's Hecuba. My wonderful actors were several of my wonderful and incredibly supportive friends: Dr. Cohen, Sam Henderson, Megan Barrett, Alex Barrett, Rhiannon Knol, Eric Struble, Lindsay Wood, and Lorenzo Alvarez. Thanks again, guys. :)

6. My project won the Best Senior Paper award for my college, and one of the options I was offered as a result of this was to submit it to Apollon, a new academic journal that would consider my project for publication. I agreed to try for it.

7. In mid June, I got the following email from the Apollon office:

"Based on our initial reading of your play, The Jurymen, we believe that your paper has the potential to be considered for publication. We are interested in publishing material that are distinct both in content and style. However, your paper does not fulfill our submission requirements, as we seek to publish research papers that are within 2000-6000 words. Having said that, I would stress here that we are willing to make an exception and ignore the word limit for your paper as it seems unique and polished."

I do a few edits and sent the play off again, with the expectation of hearing back in August.

8. Tuesday I sent an email asking about the progress of my play. I got the following in response:

"The editors were highly impressed by many things in your work and have come to the conclusion that “The Jurymen” is a highly creative and an exceptionally well written play that strives to educate and entertain both Classicists as well as the average reader. Although we had initial reservations about your work due to its length being much longer than our usual submissions, we are glad we have had the chance to receive your work..."

9. After a few "minor changes", I'll send it back, and they'll publish it! :) It's a small and new academic journal, so it's not incredibly visible, but it's still a big step for me. This whole experience has already been far more rewarding than I was expecting; all I wanted to do was pass senior sem! xD

Thank you so much to everyone who encouraged and supported me while this was coming together. I couldn't have pulled it all off on my own.

I received a review from Apollon, as well, which I will post here in a few moments.

I found a moment to breathe

Welcome to Senior Year!

Hi everyone!

Well, I haven't written much in awhile, and now that I'm stateside for an indefinite amount of time, I'm afraid my blog won't be nearly as interesting as it has been for the past year. Alas, I have no foreign adventures to write on now, just my adventures from my senior year at Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, VA. I have no idea what I'm going to do with my life after college, and I'm guessing many of my entries might be written tackling that issue and my indecision. If you have any suggestions on what you think I should do, please by all means shoot me an email at indianajans@gmail.com. I need all the help I can get.

Conquering the Blue Ridge Parkway, one mountain at a time

But I'm trying to make the most of the year and carry on my traveling mentality to get out and explore more of the local attractions around me. For example, the Blue Ridge Mountains have been practically in my backyard for two years and I'd yet to venture into them. Well, a group of us Readingites decided that needed to change, and last week we went hiking on Otter's Peaks. We ended up walking the whole of Sharp Point Mountain in just a couple of hours, including several breaks, and it was gorgeous. The term 'Blue Ridge' is simply perfect for these mountains; as we were driving in we saw the peak in the distance, and it looked almost like a painted blue line across the sky. I found a place to climb out to get the view above, and it was unlike anything I'd ever seen; not even in Greece did I see a mountain vista so beautiful. Everything was shades of blue and green, it was the most calming, seclusive place I've seen. It's what I would image the mountains of Peru to look like, but I haven't seen them, so I'll have to get back to you on that.

Us at the summit!

We made a pact to try and make a hiking journey as much as we possibly can this year. The next two weekends are all booked for us, but hopefully after then we'll get back out on the trails. I'm not sure if we'll get a more gorgeous day than our first one out, but we can try. I think hiking will be a great source of stress relief this year. With all the work already piling up for us seniors, the feeling of going somewhere to be outside where we don't think about those papers and books for a day will be incredible.

Speaking of work, I'm up to my head in it. I've certainly found myself missing those lazy days in England, where I went to class 3 times a week and spent the rest of the time going out on the town, traveling into London, or staying in to watch movies. It seems like I can barely hold onto my time now, and I'm constantly in a state of productivity, constantly on the move. For right now I'm keeping up with classes, but only just.

But I'm doing things this year that I've always wanted to try: I tried out for and joined the school choir, I started a job as a barista in the campus coffee stand, I'm enrolled in a creative writing (screenwriting) class, and I will soon be co-DJing a radio show on the WWRM--the campus radio station. More information on that last point as I get it; the show is available online and can be heard all over the world, so you'll all have to tune in! A theatre friend--Melissa Gilbert--and I are running it, and we plan on broadcasting musicals and recording old radio plays. We hope to cast and record our own version of the original War of the World radio broadcast for Halloween, so look forward to it!


In short, this year may not be filled with train rides across Europe or conversations in broken English with Greek locals in cafes, but that doesn't mean I'm going to let it be boring. I'm hoping to make the most of my last year in college, and after that, who knows? Maybe it's a good thing that I have no set plans for myself. I'm open to anywhere the world takes me for now, and I'm planning on enjoying the ride.