>I would like to enable authors to submit articles of 10-30,000 words via a form

Do you already have a web site up and are looking to add this functionality?

There are many well known open source programs such as Joomla that work as articles sites, allow contents to be emailed, printed or saved as pdf. Joomla is also free but has a huge userbase with thousands of plugins.

However, if you already use a custom solution, Joomla wouldn't work.

Just a thought,
Chris

BTW: PDF articles are also indexed via many search engines like Google, Yahoo, Fast, Alltheweb ECT. PDF's files can also bring additional traffic. Just make sure the author has credit in the file with a link saying it came from your site.