Slippery Rock resident, instructor of the retired celebrates being published in literary mag
Although she had a few works distributed in news publications and even self-published a few of her own stories, Dorie Schleiden said one of her biggest accomplishments was writing a story for SLAB, Slippery Rock University’s literary magazine.
SLAB is run by students of the university, but doesn’t include many works by local writers, so Schleiden said her inclusion in the 2025 edition of the magazine feels special. The fact that she didn’t start writing seriously until she retired six years ago and was published at age 72 adds to her excitement about being published in the magazine.
“I could have taken up gardening, but I took up writing,” Schleiden said of her retirement activity. “I wasn't able to write until I did retire. Now, I am just crazy about it.”
Schleiden, of Slippery Rock, dipped her toe into creative writing after she retired by taking classes at SRU’s Institute for Learning in Retirement. She now leads a writing workshop for the institute, where she relays her writing knowledge and that of one of her mentors, Mark O’Connor, who also cofounded SLAB.
In Schleiden’s mind, anyone can be a writer, but it can take a lot of encouragement for an author to actually send in one of their works for publication because of a fear of being judged.
“I think a lifetime of reading has helped me become a writer,” Schleiden said. “I actually always wrote and had a pile of tablets with half stories that were started but never finished, poetry that I didn’t even know if it was good or not.”
SLAB — or “Sound & Literary Art Book” — was founded in 2005 by O’Connor and Danette DiMarco, according to the publication’s website. Students of the university gather submissions throughout the year and compile the art and articles before editing them and sending the publication to print. The physical book usually arrives in October.
The 2025 SLAB, which is the 20th edition of the magazine, is composed of 62 pages per genre, which includes fiction, poetry and creative nonfiction.
Costello Keene, one of two associate managing editors of the 20th issue of SLAB, explained the publication’s editors solicit submissions from around the country and even the world. This leads to the magazine getting many submissions, which the editors have to narrow down over the course of a school year.
“We get submissions from all over the nation, sometimes internationally. We have published a few people from Sweden, the UK,” said Keene, who is a junior secondary education English major at SRU. “We usually outsource a lot to grad programs. We get submissions from fairly prolific authors.”
Many of SLAB’s staff members are in English degree programs at SRU, and Keene said much of their job consists of reading and editing submissions. When an SRU student does write for the magazine, it’s often for a specific reason.
“We are completely student-run, but we don’t usually accept student work, except in extenuating circumstances,” Keene said. “Our Slippery Rock students are usually hand-selected … Usually, our students are selected prior to them writing for SLAB.”
In addition to O’Connor, Schleiden credited two alumni of SLAB with helping her work up the courage to submit one of her nonfiction stories, Meg Salizzoni and Aodhan Ridenour.
Ridenour, who was the assistant to the fiction editor of SLAB for the 19th issue, said he sat next to Schleiden during his first class at SRU, writing for graphic novels, and continued to work with her in writing classes throughout his time at the university. He said even though he didn’t work on the 20th issue of SLAB, which contains a story by Schleiden, he recognized her as a skilled writer even during their classes together.
He also commended the story for its depth of detail.
“Dorie and I were great friends,” Ridenour said. “Her story has that ‘more than meets the eye’ quality, which is really important for a writer. She was always good at that.”
Schleiden’s story in SLAB is titled “Cowboys Grow Old” and is about her uncle, Howard, who worked on a highway during President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Federal Highway Administration Emergency Relief program. The story is a page-and-a-half long and also describes a childhood memory of Schleiden’s from when her uncle lived with her and her family.
The story, Schleiden said, grew out of a writing exercise taught by O’Connor. Following his prompt, Schleiden said it was not hard to write a story based on a person in her life.
“Dr. O'Connor said try to imagine someone you know now, but much younger,” Schleiden said. “I thought about my uncle with one arm.”
Like most published works, the story was finally printed after a lot of writing and rewriting by Schleiden and the SLAB editors. She said the process was productive and smooth thanks to the staff of SLAB, which worked on it with her.
“It started as a journal entry that we did in class,” Schleiden said. “Then, I took it and had to edit and edit and edit.”
Keene commented the work SLAB’s staff members take on means they will get a wide range of writing styles and quality of writing, giving them a lot of experience with editing. She said it is satisfying to see a work go from its first draft to appearing in a physical edition of a magazine.
“The experience is different from a lot of university magazines because we are student-run and our submissions don't rely entirely on student work,” Keene said. “Our staff has to have a grasp on writing, what makes a piece good. All around, I think it's just an excellent experience, the amount of exposure you get to good writing.”
Schleiden said she sees each of her published works as better than the last, and the creative nonfiction story she got into SLAB is another improvement. She said the magazine is a good opportunity for aspiring and blooming writers, because the editors work with submissions to get them to the point where they are ready to be shared with the world.
“They have just given me so many opportunities,” Schleiden said.
The 20th issue of SLAB is available to purchase online from the magazine’s website, slablitmag.org.
