Hi! I’m glad you’re here.
Who are you?
My name is Roxanne and I love words. My brain is a non-stop “What If?” machine. I’m especially drawn to poems and short stories because I enjoy the challenge of taking giant concepts and expressing them in a condensed space. The pursuit of whimsy is serious business at Classic Roxanne. My vision for this site is “McSweeney’s but if everything was written by one person (me)”. If that’s of interest to you, welcome! I’m excited we’ve found each other.
What’s your deal?
I’ve been writing poems and short stories for over 30 years. I studied creative writing and poetry in both undergrad at the University of Mary Washington and grad school at the University of Edinburgh. My work has been published in print journals, online collections, mixed media projects, and collaborative art & poetry books. Examples of these pieces are available on my website. A fuller collection of my poems can be found on my Instagram.
I chose to write on Substack because a lot of popular online communities aren’t set up great for creative writing ventures. Trying to get an idea across with a limited number of characters or making a video where I talk directly to viewers aren’t realms where I thrive. Posting here kind of feels like I’ve left a notebook on a table and you’ve come along and snuck a peek at a few pages, which works much better for me. It’s a little voyeuristic but it helps me to know you’re out there reading this.
An obstacle to my writing is overthinking things and never wanting to share anything unless it’s fully complete and perfect. This site is a bit of a verbal sketchbook for me, a casual space to practice and play with concepts or ideas I’ve had. It also helps me get comfortable putting my writing into the world without laboring over it for months.
Roxanne, why this? Why now?
I realize that the world is on fire and there are much more pressing matters at hand. I also feel strongly about the necessity for art and empathy as a human reaction to the world. Margaret Atwood said "A word after a word after a word is power." And in a time when feeling powerless is a common experience, my response is to dedicate more of my time and energy to creative pursuits.
What’s in it for me, the reader?
My goal is to give you something entertaining to read that will distract you from the real world for a few minutes. I’ll be experimenting with short stories, poems, lists, conversations, reviews and any other ideas I come up with that make sense to put here.
Much like real pen-pals in the olden days, there’s no real way to predict when you’re going to open a physical mailbox and receive a new letter. Same with your inbox. Can you expect certain posts on specific days? You can certainly try. My goal is 3-4 posts per month but we’ll just see how this goes.
There are three different ways you can receive these stories:
as a newsletter in email form
following along online like a blog
through the Substack app
Substack offers lots of different options, so here are some troubleshooting articles that may answer your questions if you need help. Classic Roxanne is currently free to subscribe for everyone. I may incorporate a paid subscription option eventually but not charging anything now gives me more freedom to play around with what I post.
Thanks for reading all this. I hope you like it! If you do, tell your friends! If you don’t, you can also tell your friends how much you hate it. I’m not the boss of you.
xoxox
Roxanne
