Collier’s, the National Weekly
When a writer wants to please an editor, the surest way is to forget all about him. The editor is not reading the story for his own entertainment. He reads with only one idea in mind: “Will this story appeal to all kinds of people? Is it a good story?”
An editor of a magazine of general circulation seldom seeks one particular kind of story. He wants the best stories written. The quickest way to his favor is to write them.
There are no set rules for accomplishing this. Only a few landmarks are on the road. Know your subject. Have something to tell. Be sure that something happens in the story.
If nothing happens, if there is no action, you have perhaps written a very good essay or a very convincing argument—but you will not be able to sell it as a short story.
Remember that you are writing a short story, not a condensed novel. A short story, once started, has only one object—to end as quickly as possible.
There are only two people who can infallibly detect padding in a story. One is yourself. The other is the reader.
It pays, always, to be clean. A questionable story will attract many people—but it will repel more.
Few writers succeed in being convincing when they wander into fields they don’t know. Every man collects a mass of information concerning the road over which he has traveled, and the people he met on the way. Use this information. It will furnish all the short stories you can ever write.
Just as people strive for “happy endings” in their own affairs, so they like them in stories which they read for entertainment.
The enduring themes for short stories are the enduring themes in life itself; the old copybook virtues, like self-sacrifice, courage, generosity, resourcefulness and faith.
The writer succeeds in proportion as he makes his reader eager for another story by him. Editors have ways to judge this reaction. Forget the editor, and what you think he wants. Write directly to the man or woman who is going to buy the magazine and read your story.
Harford Powell, Jr.
Collier’s, The National Weekly.
416 West 13th Street,
New York City.