Category «Editors»

Money, again (Mistake #85)

I’ve been experiencing a flurry of talented students emailing me with news of writing successes. “What fee have you been offered?” is my knee-jerk response to each communication, though I usually manage to check myself and squeeze in a “Congratulations!” before the filthy dosh question invariably spills over. (As an aside, I once went through …

Bitten by the Hand That Feeds (Mistake #83)

It’s not always appropriate to call up an editor. Email is usually fine. But sometimes – say if you have an idea which is topical and brilliant and you need to move quickly – it is perfectly acceptable, even preferable, to do so. Occasionally a student will need cajoling into making the call. “Editors don’t …

Acceptance is publication (Mistake #82)

“Is it definitely going in?” This is the question a student of mine asked me towards the end of last year, after having received an acceptance of a speculatively submitted article. She was thrilled. As she had every right to be. She was soon to become a published writer. Or was she? Quite a lot …

Letters as clippings (Mistake #78)

A lot of new writers break into print via the letters page in a magazine or newspaper. At least, that’s the case with my students, as the course for which I’m a correspondence tutor encourages writers to submit letters and other fillers to magazines quite early on, and it surprises some students how quickly this …

Fretting (Mistake #77)

“Is my font okay? Should I indent my paragraphs? My margins are all right aren’t they? Shall I centre justify my title? Ought I number the pages? Is my cover letter too long? Too short? Too casual? What did you say about my font again?” If it’s a font I have seen before, doesn’t have …

Submitting a good idea (Mistake #69)

If you’re a new writer, having a good idea is good, but submitting a good idea may not be good enough. You don’t need me to tell you that breaking into magazines and newspapers is hard. Attracting an editor’s attention – merely getting a reply to your emails – is tough enough. And there are …

Editors have the time, really (Mistake #53)

It’s a favourite writers’ moan: editors not responding to articles or queries. I tend to trot out the usual defences: they’re under no obligation to reply, they get inundated with emails, they’re really really busy and don’t have the time… “Of course they have the time,” I hear too often, sometimes from established writers, and …

“Dear Editorial Director…” (Mistake #51)

Query from a student, who’d been looking at the flannel panel in a publication: “To whom should an idea be sent?” Good question. I liked that the student asked it, that she didn’t just ignore the issue, that she didn’t think it unimportant, that she didn’t tell herself “Oh, it’s a dumb question”, that it …

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