I too am a journalist, writer, editor --- without a formal degree. It is heartening to hear from others that they learned on the job. Your notes on structure and research in particular, spoke to me. I am in my late 70's, still contributing as a yournalist, writer. Two of my family members have formal journalism MA's and are not working in the field at all. Gail B
Fixed. One of the fun things with Substack is that if it goes out to 5,600 email boxes with formatting errors, I can't reach out into those emails to fix the mistakes. I can only fix it here. Sigh.
Hi Paul, I admire and share your newsletter. You are an excellent role model for other journalists in terms of craft, talent and integrity. I’m going to quibble on a couple points only because you are so (deservedly) influential. Most of your examples of good writing or theoretical situations are male or male oriented. Examples of things you dislike or give qualified approval to tend to be female. Samantha Bee is on record as saying she’s not a journalist, so it seems a bit lopsided to use her as an example for journalists on how not to do it. You praise Susan Orlean, but your mystification about how she does it makes your approval feel qualified. (“She’s a witch!”😊) All this stuff is so nuanced, and seemingly trivial, but that’s why it can be so insidious. You have so much power as a respected senior journalist — I hope you understand that’s why I’m bothering to weigh in at all. Cheers!
Hi Ellen, good to hear from you. I think the points you raise are fair. Since some of what I write here is memoir, to some extent I'm a product of my time. Steinbeck-Hemingway-Fitzgerald-Orwell is a seriously over-trodden path, but it was the 80s. Incidentally, I got quite a bit more information, and useful belated lessons, from reading and meeting Susan Orlean than I ever did from Hemingway, whom I read diligently and then left behind with some relief. Sam Bee, I should point out, gets off more lightly in the interview piece than Conan O'Brien does. But I could certainly have pointed readers to Joan Didion, June Callwood, Yaa Gyasi, Christiane Amanpour as an interviewer, Muriel Spark and many others, several of whom I discovered later in my own development. I meant what I say in the piece on voice: This is my list, yours will be yours and, for that reason, better for you. Over time I plan to make all kinds of room here for diverse voices, including, I hope soon, by having writers from other backgrounds write here. Thanks for your thoughtful note.
I too am a journalist, writer, editor --- without a formal degree. It is heartening to hear from others that they learned on the job. Your notes on structure and research in particular, spoke to me. I am in my late 70's, still contributing as a yournalist, writer. Two of my family members have formal journalism MA's and are not working in the field at all. Gail B
I just noticed that every single point in this essay is numbered "1." Swing and a miss, Substack auto-formatting algorithm
Fixed. One of the fun things with Substack is that if it goes out to 5,600 email boxes with formatting errors, I can't reach out into those emails to fix the mistakes. I can only fix it here. Sigh.
The first paragraph also repeats before #1 and after, except before is missing the first letter (for me it starts with "n 1994 (I know!"
Fixed that (a new mess I made while I was fixing the first one) too. Thanks for flagging it.
Hi Paul, I admire and share your newsletter. You are an excellent role model for other journalists in terms of craft, talent and integrity. I’m going to quibble on a couple points only because you are so (deservedly) influential. Most of your examples of good writing or theoretical situations are male or male oriented. Examples of things you dislike or give qualified approval to tend to be female. Samantha Bee is on record as saying she’s not a journalist, so it seems a bit lopsided to use her as an example for journalists on how not to do it. You praise Susan Orlean, but your mystification about how she does it makes your approval feel qualified. (“She’s a witch!”😊) All this stuff is so nuanced, and seemingly trivial, but that’s why it can be so insidious. You have so much power as a respected senior journalist — I hope you understand that’s why I’m bothering to weigh in at all. Cheers!
Hi Ellen, good to hear from you. I think the points you raise are fair. Since some of what I write here is memoir, to some extent I'm a product of my time. Steinbeck-Hemingway-Fitzgerald-Orwell is a seriously over-trodden path, but it was the 80s. Incidentally, I got quite a bit more information, and useful belated lessons, from reading and meeting Susan Orlean than I ever did from Hemingway, whom I read diligently and then left behind with some relief. Sam Bee, I should point out, gets off more lightly in the interview piece than Conan O'Brien does. But I could certainly have pointed readers to Joan Didion, June Callwood, Yaa Gyasi, Christiane Amanpour as an interviewer, Muriel Spark and many others, several of whom I discovered later in my own development. I meant what I say in the piece on voice: This is my list, yours will be yours and, for that reason, better for you. Over time I plan to make all kinds of room here for diverse voices, including, I hope soon, by having writers from other backgrounds write here. Thanks for your thoughtful note.
Useful advice to all writers!