Student newspaper seeks made-up stories

The Signal will have a new Literary Arts section as part of its Life and Arts page, featuring contributed works by students, faculty, staff and alumni.

Editors hope to fill a void created by the loss of the university’s student-published magazines Bayousphere and The Marrow, by providing a venue for students to be able to publish poetry, short stories and essays. Sam Savell, managing editor for The Signal, imagines the Literary Arts section will be a great outlet for student expression.

“In the past, the people of UHCL had an outlet for creative writing through The Marrow and Bayousphere, but neither of these literary magazines has been printed in a few years,” Savell said. “Establishing a literary arts venue via The Signal restores a home for anyone at UHCL to exhibit and publish their talents in poetry, short stories and essays through student publications.”

John Gorman, retired professor of literature, creator of Bayousphere and The Marrow, and UHCL’s former poet laureate, believes that such publications can create national recognition for students, faculty, staff and alumni.

“Bayousphere and Marrow reinforced everything I’d long believed about the capacity of people in general – represented in a student body neither hand-selected nor over-directed ­– produce worthy work,” Gorman said. “Over the years we’ve directed a great many creative master’s projects and thesis. People of all ages, races, genders and nationalities – campus students and those in our program at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice – have won honors and enlivened the literary scene.”

Gorman agrees with Savell’s assessment that the departure of both The Marrow and Bayousphere left a hole for student expression at UHCL. Gorman believes any form of student expression is important for students.

“Student expression is important as an aspect of the task of self-knowledge – its exploration, clarification and expansion,” Gorman said. “Literary work has a ‘therapeutic’ value, but beyond that it’s an introduction to the traditions, forms and disciplines of literary art. Original productivity in the arts is part of the life and value of the university. May the stories and poems excel. May links to The Signal website go viral.”

Editors of The Signal have created the Literary Arts section in anticipation of April, National Poetry Month.

To kick off the debut of the Literary Arts section, The Signal will be sponsoring a Twitter haiku contest in which the winner will receive a t-shirt with his or her haiku printed on it. The contest will run April 2-30. Contest rules and information will be posted in the Literary Arts section and on The Signal’s homepage before the contest starts April 2.

“Haikus are fun and quickly made, so it’s easy for anyone at UHCL to participate by tweeting their haiku with the hashtag #UHaikuCL and it will automatically be entered in our contest. For example, ‘Look at this cool shirt; it has your haiku on it; ha ha ha ha ha,’” joked Savell, demonstrating the poetry’s art form.