Submissions for the first edition of Survivors to Superheroes’ literary journal opened January 23rd! In honor of this exciting new development, we interviewed Georgina Liucci, the director of our literary journal.
Laura: Hi Georgina!
Georgina: Hello!
L: I guess just to start out, tell me a little bit about yourself—who you are and how you got involved in the organization?
G: I’m a Creative Writing major at SUNY Purchase. I met Julia spring of 2019 in a poetry class, and we became friends early in the semester. We were eating dinner together that spring when she first told me about her idea for Survivors to Superheroes, so I knew that it was something she was working on.
Then, this fall semester, we were in a car ride together talking about Survivors and everything Julia had done to get it off the ground, and she told me she was interested in opening new avenues for the organization through the creation of a literary journal. I was instantly onboard. That week, we sat in a Starbucks and basically worked out the logistics of making the lit journal. Since then, I’ve been working with Natalia to prepare for our first edition!
L: Tell me a bit more about the lit journal—what has it been like to work on it so far?
G: First, we had a couple of meetings where we just talked about all the things we would need. We knew that we’d need a software to create the physical lit journal, so that was one of the first things we wanted to get sorted out. We looked into InDesign, but we wanted an option that was free. Through a bit of trial and error, we found Scribus, which is similar to InDesign but free.
L: Nice!
G: Yeah, it’s pretty legit! Things were a bit stressful in the beginning, but that’s often how it goes when you’re transferring information from written word to text. But after a while, we got the hang of it. Then, we also wound up spending several meetings working on our mission statement and submission guidelines.
L: Okay, big question. Why a lit journal?
G: The name of the journal is Persist, Prevail, Prosper, and that’s really what the lit journal is about. Creative outlets for any kind of trauma are so important; creativity is a great way to process what you’re going through and move forward.
Especially as we are writers—Julia is a writer, I’m a writer, and so many other members of our team are as well—we know firsthand how much writing has helped us personally. We know that people are out there writing about their trauma, and we want to give them a space to write and inspire others with their work.
L: I really love that idea—using art to process trauma and heal. Can you talk to me a bit more about that?
G: Writing saved my life, in a time when I wanted to not be alive anymore. When I was at my lowest, I wrote my first screenplay, and it changed my life.
I’ve always been drawn to stories about survival. Books about people dealing with trauma and how they got past it—that always empowered me as a teen. I think that people’s best work tends to be when it’s fueled by truth in their own life.
L: What would you say to people who are thinking about submitting to the lit journal, but aren’t sure?
G: Just send it! Anything you have, just send it in. It’s our first edition, and anyone that we speak to, we’re going to establish a connection with.
This isn’t TIME magazine. Our purpose is to show literature, of course, but also to provide you a voice.
Whatever you have that you think you should submit, send it in. If your piece isn’t exactly what we’re looking for, we can provide feedback and work with you until you have a piece that is. We want you to have a voice.
