Very true. Of course now I wonder if you posted this quote in preparation for reading slush.

Not in specific at the moment, but I wouldn’t say I didn’t have that in mind.

P.S. Also, award ballot time.

Of course, sometimes a more attentive reading will reveal things that one would otherwise miss. As an example, Gardner Dozois rejected Alex Irvine's story "Agent Provocateur" when it was submitted to Asimov's. After it was published on Strange Horizons, Dozois realized he liked the story enough to include it in a Year's Best SF volume.

Ted, did not something similar happen with your own story “Understand”? To quote from the afterword of your collection:

“This story had collecte a bunch of rejection slips when I first sent it out, but Spider encouraged me to resubmit after I had Clarion on my resume. I made some revisions and sent it out, and ti got a much better response the second time around.”

Which begs several questions:

1) Did you send the first version of “Understand” to Asimov’s, and received their form #1?
2) The second time around, were the better responeses due to the Clarion credit, or because of the revisions?
3) And while the majority of submissions on your average slushpile is probably not up to scratch, does not the fact that discarding everything on first impression—as the Dozois quote seems to imply—harbour the danger of rejecting the sort of story that reveals its power only after a second reading?

I know: Asimov’s receives over 800 subs a month, and All-Star Zeppelin Adventures and Twenty Epics probably get over 500 subs, so separating the wheat from the chaff is a huge job.
But as an avid reader I often find that stories that didn’t quite catch my fancy on the first read, but somehow still linger, in many cases join the ranks of my favorites when a second—or subsequent—reading unveils their true riches.

Therefore, I try to be weary of first impressions (although I’m just as guilty on making them as anybody else). Professionally, I’m a technical specialist for a propulsion company, but I look like a heavy metal guitar player. So a lot of people equate me as “less intelligent” because of my looks. However, after I perform the job, the majority of customers ask to send me again when they have problems, because they do not forget me.
Actually, my own boss admitted—on an office party on which we both had more than a few drinks—that initially he thought that hiring me was the stupidest thing they did, but that he now conceded that it was actually a very good move.

So yes, I have a personal bias against making first impressions too soon (although that sounds like an oxymoron).

****

Gardner: I HAVE published things in my Best of the Year anthology that I rejected for ASIMOV'S.

Gardner: There's two reasons for this. One, sometimes something is just WRONG for ASIMOV'S, but still is a good enough story to get in.

Gardner: But the more frequent reason is, I screwed up.

Gardner: Sometimes you'll read a story and it leaves you cold for some reason, or you even dislike it.

Gardner: THen, you read it again, in the context of another magazine, and you say "Hey, this is great! What moron would have let this get by him? Oh, wait, it's ME!"

Datlow: that's happened with turning down stories that later went on to have great impact in the field.

Datlow: You can't buy everything and sometimes you either make a mistake or you genuinely don't like a story...

Datlow: that everyone else loves.
Gardner: Sometimes you're just in a bad mood that day, not receptive, or you're reading too fast, or you strike something in the story that makes you dislike it. Then later, when reading in a different mood, you change your mind.

****

From the same SCIFI.COM chat from which the quote was taken.

I rest my case.