February 24th, 2010 / 5:19 pm
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Laura Ellen Scott gives 21 writing tips, including, “13. Write what you know, especially you white people out there” and “17. Italics, italics, italics. Especially for flashbacks.” This is the sort of sharing the Internet was invented for.
Tags: laura ellen scott
I love me some smart-ass. Very good.
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I do 15 way too much in poems.
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This made me laugh when I read it yesterday. Writer’s Digest continues to baffle me. Their understanding of writing and publishing is so narrow, so limited and the advice they publish month in and month out only perpetuates the many myths out there about the business of writing. I live by #11.
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As publisher of Writer’s Digest, what we do also gives me existential pause — you can read about it here: http://janefriedman.com/2010/02/20/the-dirty-secret-behind-writing-advice/
But that aside, you might enjoy the book we published a few years ago that poked fun at ourselves:
FONDLING YOUR MUSE by John Warner
http://www.amazon.com/Fondling-Your-Muse-Infallible-Published/dp/1582973482
It was based on his pieces over at McSweeney’s, like “Making Your Characters Round in No Time Flat.”
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February 24th, 2010 / 11:56 pmmimi—
salesperson
“existential pause”
I must respect that.
“dirty secret”
Something I would like.
“poked fun at ourselves”
I must do that with some friends sometime.
“Fondling-Your-Muse-Infallible-Published”
I like that.
(And I think I should try to do that but I’m not sure how it’s done.)
“Mak[e] Round…. in No Time Flat”
I like that.
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February 25th, 2010 / 8:29 amdavid e—
That John Warner is not better known is a terrible thing. His posts in Zoetrope private groups are so interesting. He has forgotten more about the publishing biz than I’ll ever learn.
Really enjoyed your dirty secret list, Jane. I think a bracing book (as one commenter called it) would do well, especially if such book talked about your role at WD and your existential crises.
Maybe you could have a chapter about writers getting excited to be published in non-paying journals. Sometimes I lose track of how most non-writers feel about that “phenomenon.” I get confused looks from my friends who find out I write short stories and bother submitting to non-paying journals. Actually, my friends are nowhere near as incredulous as my Grandma.
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This is so great: 1) Laura Ellen Scott did her thing (I had to post it on Twitter once I saw it, and then she told me all the “tips bots” were retweeting her parody, ha!); 2) Adam Robinson talked about it here; 3) Jane Friedman just a few days before addressed her concerns w/ all of this prescriptive stuff that just so happens to sell magazines and then gets reposted all over the e-verse. It’s just so great. I don’t know what else to say. OK, thank you all, and I LOVE the Internet.
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February 24th, 2010 / 11:59 pmRoxane—
Seriously. The Internet is magic.
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The thing is that I didn’t know about the Writer’s Digest thing. I just thought that Laura posted some good advice.
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