When the opportunity arises, I seek writing advice for the words I've written. Mostly it's after I've written a new profile or dipped my hand in attempting a new narrative piece. I want to better myself and find out what I'm doing right and the many, many things I need to improve on.
Not always will I get a response on my queries. Gary Smith, a senior writer at Sports Illustrated and probably the greatest magazine writer out there, has been gracious enough on multiple occasions to critique my words and help further my writing.
I also read tons of forums and blog posts, I listen to podcasts and watch interviews, all in which a great writer has contributed. And one day I got to thinking: while it's all out there for the world to find, why not condense it into one place for all the other writers, like me, who are looking to better themselves.
So, ladies and gentleman, I present you a new segment I'd like to call Words of Wisdom.
Every so often, I'll post some advice I've either received personally, or advice found from some of the best journalists and writers that have graced us with words on a page.
Some of the words will come from the same person multiple times. Some will come from up and comers who finally landed their big break. But they all have made it to the big show and are kind enough to offer a few words of wisdom.
Today, we'll start with Chris Jones, writer at large for Esquire.
For those of you who don't know Jones, he's the winner of two National Magazine Awards, an award equivalent to the Pulitzer Prize for newspapers, for his stories The Things That Carried him, the story of Sgt. Joe Montgomery's return to the U.S. after dying in Iraq; and Home, the story of two American astronauts stranded on the International Space Station after the space shuttle Columbia exploded leaving them with no way home.
Unfortunately, I've never had the chance to speak one on one with Jones, but I follow his blog religiously. The other day in his post, Gone, Baby, Gone, he said:
"In a lot of ways, I am lucky. I have nearly everything I've wanted. But here's an ugly little secret: Once you get a taste of what that's like, once you get where you think it is you want to go, that only makes your wanting worse. Whatever that longing is, whatever that ambition is, it has a stronger grip on me now than it ever has. Nobody tells you that. Nobody tells you that only once you get to the top of that mountain you're climbing will you see the mountain you should have been climbing all along."
I don't know if truer words have ever been written.
Is that not true for all up-and-coming writers? You start out in college, let's say, with the dream of being hired after graduation to a newspaper. You start out in a small town daily with the goal to move to a bigger paper, to a bigger, until your writing is so good, you're working for The New York Times or writing for Esquire.
For me, that dream is to one day own my own magazine. Crazy, yes. But it's the mountain I climb every day.
It's a fight to keep that dream alive. I can only hope for me, and all of you, that one day, nearing 70, you can look back and see gaze upon all the mountains you've topped, and the dreams you've achieved.
But, for now, it's time to get back to climbing.
Follow Jones's blog here.
Jones is on Twitter @MySecondEmpire.
Next Words of Wisdom, Gary Smith on lede writing: You're doing it wrong.
At TIPA, Jody Dean was talking and said something along the lines of, "I want you to all ignore the goals/dreams you have. You shouldn't have goals, you should have visions."
ReplyDeleteI meant to share it with you. Because I know your goal/dream is to have this magazine. When instead you should have a vision. Cus' I have no doubt that you'll one day get there.
That's all :)