In Alice in Wonderland, a demented and very irascible Mad Hatter hosted the tea party Alice attended. Lewis Carroll’s Mad Hatter may have been modeled after someone who was not an actual hat maker or “hatter”; the etymology of the term has been debated. Mad hatters in Carroll’s day, and even through the mid-Twentieth Century, in some locations, were victims of mercury poisoning. The poor, working-class hatters worked with hot solutions of mercuric nitrate, in poorly ventilated rooms. This environment caused neurological damage, resulting in such symptoms as tremors, slurred speech, irritability, and depression. Mad Hatters’ Review, an annual online multimedia magazine welcomes writings that address psychosocial issues, the pollution of minds, hearts, bodies and nature. We also welcome purely aesthetic pieces, packed with surprising images and whimsical wordplays. The name of our annual reflects our view of the world as essentially demented and nonsensical, too frequently a nightmare or “non-dream” that needs to be exposed to the light for what it is, as well as what it is not. However, we, as artists, can also see another side of this world by voyaging into our own unique terrifying and joyful wonderlands and sharing our visions with others. If you're thinking of submitting, rest assured that Mad Hatters decry the standard “we want the best writings on the Internet.” We are firmly rooted in theories of relativity and we try hard not to take ourselves seriously. We want you to give us what delights you, what makes you leap and dance, what makes you cry deeply inside the core of yourself, and what you’ve revised and re-revised till it shines. We will never tell you, “Sorry, your submission (whatever it was) is interesting, but it doesn’t suit our current needs.” Our aesthetic predilections aren’t affected by global warming. We’re particularly interested in “edgy,” risky, gutsy, thematically broad (i.e., saying something about the world and its creatures), psychologically and philosophically sophisticated works. We usually opt for “maximalism” over minimalism, but we’re open-minded. Black/dark humor, whimsy, wise satire, irony, magic realism and surrealism are welcome. We love humor because we need it! Traditional arc, resolution, “story” structure are beside or off the point. We look for originality, surprise, intellectual and emotional strength, lyricism and rhythm. We love writers who stretch their imaginations to the limits and challenge pedestrian notions of reality and style; we care little for categories, favoring fusions, alien creatures, and borderline personalities. We also love collaborative ventures, between/among writers, writers and artists, and among writers, visual artists, and composers. It’s not likely that you will ever find a serious sob story of childhood nostalgia or “coming of age,” an ode to a dying grandmother, or a cute epiphany in these pages. Mad Hatters are not sentimental and they guffaw at the concept of epiphanies. Mad Hatters are zany, risky, idealistic, cynical, tragic, hysterical and edgy. They love playing in linguistic sandboxes and hurling mud pies at icons. |
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