{"id":1721,"date":"2018-06-05T09:36:57","date_gmt":"2018-06-05T09:36:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2018\/06\/05\/the-pitch-at-the-guardians-long-read-no-rigid-formula-or-geographic-limits\/"},"modified":"2024-11-18T20:30:40","modified_gmt":"2024-11-18T20:30:40","slug":"the-pitch-at-the-guardians-long-read-no-rigid-formula-or-geographic-limits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2018\/06\/05\/the-pitch-at-the-guardians-long-read-no-rigid-formula-or-geographic-limits\/","title":{"rendered":"At the Guardian’s Long Read, no rigid formula or geographic limits"},"content":{"rendered":" \n
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Sex robots, violence in Mosul and the plan for Queen Elizabeth\u2019s inevitable death. Those were among the subjects of the best stories<\/a> last year on The Guardian\u2019s eclectic longform site, The Long Read.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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\u201cWe don\u2019t have a simple formula,\u201d says commissioning editor David Wolf. \u201cBut we\u2019re always looking for great stories \u2014 particularly those that take place in the world of ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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The Pitch<\/h2>\n\n
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In an occasional series, Storyboard examines the elusive art of the story pitch. We talk to writers and editors about their tips, tricks and pet peeves, and annotate some real pitches.<\/em><\/p>\n

Read more from The Pitch here<\/a><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n\t\n<\/div> \n

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The Long Read\u2019s appetite for articles that illuminate debates often relegated to academia sets it apart from many publishers of narrative journalism. Editors\u2019 favorite stories from 2017, for example, included think pieces on neoliberalism, statistics and \u201cthe age of banter.\u201d But even idea-driven articles should rest on solid reporting and storytelling, Wolf says.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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The Guardian has always published features off the news, but The Long Read was founded in 2014 to provide a dedicated home for magazine-length narratives. \u201cAs articles were getting shorter and the news was getting faster, there was in parallel a greater hunger for pieces that told the full story,\u201d Wolf says.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Helmed by Jonathan Shainin, formerly the online news editor for The New Yorker, the London-based site publishes three pieces a week that run  between 4,000 and 6,000 words. Around 20 percent or so are set in the U.K. Otherwise, any topic anywhere in the world is fair game. And if there is any one secret to breaking in, Wolf says, it\u2019s writing well: \u201cIf we receive a pitch that\u2019s arresting from the first sentence and feels like the writer has real control over the material, that overrules everything.\u201d<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Wolf shares other tips for pitching The Long Read below. We also take a close look at a pitch he received from Alex Blasdel for a profile of Timothy Morton<\/a> a.k.a. \u201cthe philosopher prophet of the Anthropocene.\u201d Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Is there much of a longform tradition in the U.K. compared to the U.S.?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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The U.S. longform tradition is pretty unique, but there certainly has been a history of these kinds of pieces in the U.K. An example is Granta when edited by Ian Jack. The Independent newspaper also produced a lot of great feature writers who went on to cointribute to The New Yorker, like Ian Parker and Z\u00f6e Heller. Much of this \u201csecret\u201d U.K. longform tradition is either not archived or locked behind a paywall. Places like the London Review of Books publish longform today. But it\u2019s much more marginal than in the U.S.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Do you see The Long Read as a British publication?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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We cover the world, but we do want to encourage people to think of the U.K. as a rich subject for longform stories. We\u2019ve tried to profile British institutions in a way they haven\u2019t necessarily been written about before. One of my favorites was about a pub fighting back<\/a> against developers trying to close it down; it contained the history and philosophy of the British pub. But The Guardian is a properly global publication: Our traffic is usually one-third British, one-third American and one-third rest of the world. So we try to find ways of telling stories, even about British subjects, that will be interesting and accessible everywhere. We apply the same rule to a pitch from Texas or Bolivia.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Looking at your roundup of favorite stories from 2017, what stood out about some of these?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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 <\/strong>The piece about the death of the Queen<\/a> has an incredible sense of tone and atmosphere. It proceeds in a stately, calm way \u2014 the language is perfectly chosen for the subject matter. That genre \u2014 describing a thing that hasn\u2019t happened \u2014 is one of the hardest things to pull off. In Dina Nayeri\u2019s \u201cThe Ungrateful Refugee<\/a>,\u201d which is a mixture of memoir and argument, the writing is spectacular and there\u2019s a controlled passion that\u2019s immediately powerful. Stephen Buranyi\u2019s piece about scientific publishing<\/a> takes a subject that sounds unbelievably dull and makes it into an amazing business story with incredible characters. If you can convince us that something that doesn\u2019t seem interesting at first is actually a wild world, that\u2019s great for us.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Are there parts of the world or subjects you\u2019d like to see more pitches about?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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We rarely get pitches from Latin America. Surprisingly, we get few pitches from Europe, aside from Spain and Russia. In the U.S., if a great story appears in The New York Times, three reporters are going to look into it.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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\u201cIf we receive a pitch that\u2019s arresting from the first sentence and feels like the writer has real control over the material, that overrules everything.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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In Europe, you have standard news and political reporting, but because there isn\u2019t a culture of longform, there must be tons of great narrative stories that aren\u2019t being told. One example is a story<\/a> by our Spain correspondent, Giles Tremlett, about parents who adopted a Chinese girl then murdered her. The case was incredibly famous in Spain but unknown otherwise.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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We rarely get pitches for business stories or company profiles. We\u2019d love to do more stories like one we ran in March<\/a> about the luxury stroller market.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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How often do you work with freelancers?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Guardian writers do about one-third of the pieces, and the rest are written by freelancers.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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How often do you assign stories based on cold pitches?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Assigning stories based on cold pitches is relatively rare, partly because they\u2019re often not well tailored to our needs.  Two that did work resulted in a story about a fake embassy in Ghana<\/a> and one about a chef who was one of the pioneers of molecular gastronomy and killed himself at age 28<\/a>. A lot of stories come out of chats with writers we have relationships with or who we got in touch with after reading something they wrote. But if we get a pitch that\u2019s promising, we often stay in touch with the writer. It\u2019s worth sending a pitch even if you\u2019re not sure it\u2019s spot on.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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What are common missteps you see in pitches?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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 <\/strong>The most common is not having enough familiarity with what we\u2019ve published. Just mentioning a couple of pieces we\u2019ve done immediately makes me think that this person has put some thought into why this story works for us. We also sometimes get pitches that say, \u201cI\u2019m from X country and this thing is happening. Would you like a report on it?\u201d The best pitches are cognizant of the fact that the rest of the paper does news stories and short features, and a Long Read piece has to be distinct. We\u2019re looking for big stories that unfold over time, rather than a report from a place. When it comes to pitching on subjects that have already received a lot of media coverage, it\u2019s always a good sign if the writer can show how this particular story is different from the others. It\u2019s surprisingly rare for writers to do this, and it helps the pitch stand out.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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What\u2019s your take on simultaneous submissions?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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 <\/strong>I\u2019m definitely OK with it. That said, sometimes it might suggest you haven\u2019t thought carefully enough about whether it\u2019s a fit for us.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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How much do you pay?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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It varies quite a lot, but I will say it\u2019s competitive.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Do you have a travel budget?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Yes, but we\u2019ll only do a piece that requires extensive travel with a writer we\u2019ve worked with before or who is experienced.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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What are your preferences for writers corresponding with you?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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We get about 50 pitches a week, and there are only three of us \u2013 me, Jonathan Shainin and Clare Longrigg. We try to respond to every pitch, but I\u2019m sure there are times we\u2019ve missed. If a writer hasn\u2019t heard from us in a week, they should definitely follow up. I always ask people to email rather than phoning.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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***<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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My questions are in red, Wolf\u2019s responses in blue. <\/em><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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\n \n<\/a>Did you know this writer, or was it a cold pitch?<\/span>He had worked with Jonathan Shainin a few years earlier as an editor in India, so we knew him more as an editor than a writer.<\/span><\/span>
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\n<\/a>Do you run profiles often? What makes for a good subject?<\/span> No, probably six or 10 pieces out of 150 a year. But we’re happy to receive profile pitches. There are roughly two kinds of profiles: One is of the person you’ve already heard of, like our profiles of France’s president, Emmanuel Macron<\/a>, or scientist Richard Dawkins<\/a>. The other is a person you don’t necessarily know already. The person should be personally fascinating and have an interesting story, but also illuminate a world. There has to be a reason beyond the extraordinary details of someone’s life story. In this case, the central figure was not only vivid and charismatic, but was also a way into the idea of the Anthropocene.<\/span><\/span>
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\nThe environmental philosopher Timothy Morton wants us all to \u201cfucking chill.\u201d <\/a>Was this in-your-face opening an effective way to catch your attention? You don’t expect a sentence that starts with \u201cenvironmental philosopher\u201d to end with \u201cfucking chill.\u201d<\/span> This sentence immediately suggests that the writer knows what he’s doing: He’s got your interest and surprised you. If he’d started off with the idea of the Anthropocene right away, it could feel plodding. But the shock of the first sentence and scope of the second gives you a great one-two punch.<\/span><\/span>It\u2019s not what you might expect from a thinker whose increasingly influential work grapples with the cataclysmic forces \u2013 extreme weather, submerged cities, acute resource shortages, nuclear fallout \u2013 unleashed in the Anthropocene, a new geological epoch in which human beings are dramatically reshaping the planet. <\/a>Had you heard of this philosopher?<\/span> I was familiar with his name, but hadn’t read his work and didn\u2019t really know what he was all about.<\/span><\/span>
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\nBut the man who says that the arrival of the Anthropocene means realizing \u201cthere\u2019s no exit\u201d from the \u201ccharnel ground\u201d we inhabit also finds in this predicament a carnivalesque liberation. \u201cYou think ecologically tuned life means being all efficient and pure,\u201d Morton recently tweeted. \u201cWrong. It means you can have a disco in every room of your house.\u201d <\/a>What did you think of including these quotes near the top?<\/span> It suggests that the writer has already done quite a bit of work and is thinking about how to make the piece interesting to someone who isn’t already familiar with the subject. They also give you a glimpse of Morton’s personality.<\/span><\/span>
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\nThat tweet was characteristic of Morton\u2019s philosophy, which sets out from the self-evident, but then veers wildly off the beaten track. His idiosyncratic body of thought \u2013 devouring everything from Romantic poetry and cutting-edge sound art, to superdeep boreholes and Blade Runner \u2013 is now breaking into the mainstream. Morton was recently named one of the fifty most influential living philosophers. His work has been reviewed at length in the US edition of Newsweek and cited in the New York Times. The co-director of the Serpentine, Hans Ulrich Obrist, recently told readers of Vogue that Morton\u2019s books were the most important cultural works out there. <\/a>Did this external affirmation of his importance sway you? How important is a timely hook?<\/span> The writer is obviously conscious here that this guy isn\u2019t a household name. Obviously, reviews in Newsweek and Obrist’s comment help answer the \u201cwhy this guy\u201d question. We work on fairly long lead times, at least a month but usually two to four months, we\u2019re not generally looking for hooks per se. We want everything we publish to have a feeling of urgency\u2014this is something that matters now\u2014without necessarily being pegged to something. This list of the ways in which he\u2019s percolating in more mainstream culture felt like a good way of saying, \u201cThis person is current and matters.\u201d But if someone is appearing in a movie coming out next week, that wouldn’t work for our timing.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0When I spoke to Morton about the possibility of profiling him, I asked which songs would be in heavy rotation at the hypothetical disco in his house. <\/a>Is it important or necessary to secure access in advance?<\/span> It depends, but I wouldn’t say it\u2019s essential. If it\u2019s an academic who isn’t constantly barraged, it’s worth seeing if you can give them a call and schedule reporting opportunities, but it’s certainly not the case that we’d expect you to. If you’re pitching a profile of a well-known person or someone at the center of a news story, it’s not essential, but it’s worth considering if you’re likely to get access. There are many things we’d go for in principle, but if you want to profile Beyonc\u00e9, you have to show us you’re likely to spend quality time with her.<\/span><\/span> At the top of his set-list was \u201cHyperballad\u201d \u2013 he specified the Subtle Abuse mix \u2013 by Bj\u00f6rk, with whom he shares a long correspondence and a co-author credit. Although he\u2019s currently writing a scholarly work attempting to fuse Marxism and dark ecology, he also has a book forthcoming from Penguin, Being Ecological, which is meant to enchant the general public. The first sentence, he told me, is: \u201cThis book contains no ecological facts whatsoever.\u201d <\/a>Why was it effective to include these details?<\/span> This tells you exactly what kind of nerdy music guy this is. It reassures me that the writer will get the character element of the profile. He’s got to be able to not only animate his ideas, but make me come away feeling like I’ve spent time with this person and seen the world through their eyes. This aside makes me think the writer is good at noticing little things.<\/span><\/span>
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\nIn many ways, the development of Morton\u2019s thought has tracked his own personal story. Born into a family of English bohemians, Morton went on to do a PhD in Romantic poetry. At some point, he was diagnosed with depression. Trying to cope opened Morton to a range of experiences, from psychoanalysis to Buddhist meditation, and his writing began to range more widely. He compares living with depression to living with the tragic knowledge of the ecological catastrophe we have created: you have to admit \u201cthat you\u2019re malfunctioning, and this malfunctioning doesn\u2019t go away, because malfunctioning is actually part of how things are.\u201d After that acceptance, Morton says, you can move, on occasion, to something that looks more like play. <\/a>Why was it important to include some of Morton’s personal story, and was this a good spot for that background?<\/span><\/span>Structurally, this comes at a nice moment. The pitch started off by grabbing your attention and giving a sense of this guy’s big ideas and why he matters, and now it tells his story. The writer also does a good job of connecting this guy\u2019s ideas with his personal life. In the best profiles, someone\u2019s ideas and life story often go hand in hand without the connection feeling overdetermined or clunky.<\/span><\/span>
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\nMorton\u2019s position \u2013 that the ecological catastrophe many of us fear has \u201calready occurred\u201d and that flourishing in the anthropocene era means accepting the limits of our capacity to control the world \u2013 sets itself against virtually every other environmental approach going. This has not made him popular with his fellow scholars. Some professional philosophers see him as a curiosity at best, and a fraud at worst. One scholarly review pointed to something \u201cof the snake oil salesman in Morton\u2019s prose.\u201d Another thinker has claimed that Morton and his small cohort of philosophical confreres, who are active bloggers, have only succeeded in generating \u201can online orgy of stupidity.\u201d Others argue he is fatally out of touch with the environmental catastrophes facing the global south: it\u2019s all well and good for an Oxford-educated, university-tenured middle-aged white man to advocate wind-powered discos and buddy up to Bj\u00f6rk \u2013 but how the hell is play going to help farmers in the world\u2019s new dust bowls? <\/a>Why was including the voices of critics important?<\/span> There’s a tendency when pitching profiles to hype up the figure a bit. This paragraph immediately signals that the writer has a critical eye and is looking at this guy in a removed way. He’s aware of the criticism, and the piece isn\u2019t going to call this guy the best thing since sliced bread and swallow all his bullshit. I feel like I’m in safe hands. This also brings in conflict: Some people are saying this guy is a brilliant thinker and illuminating problems of our age, and others are saying he’s an idiot and fraud\u2014this sounds interesting.<\/span><\/span>
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\nUltimately, though, I see this profile as a chance to profile a thinker whose ideas reflect and shape how the culture at large thinks about the current state of the world, and to tell the story of an idea \u2013 the anthropocene \u2013 which captures the precariousness, scariness and weirdness of what it\u2019s like to be alive right now. <\/a>What did you think of this closer?<\/span> After a few paragraphs about his life story and critics, it’s helpful to have a reminder of the bigger picture and the idea of the Anthropocene. It reminds me that it’s about more than just this one guy.<\/span><\/span>
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\n<\/a>What happens after you get a strong pitch like this?<\/span> We usually have a phone call or meeting with the writer and send logistical questions. Then we’ll either say yes or we’ll ask the writer to sketch a plan of the story as they see it.<\/span><\/span>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The editor’s advice: Study what’s been published before. Be authoritative, fresh and “arresting.” Dare to send a (good) cold pitch<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7257,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[407],"topics":[],"authors":[9],"issue":[],"class_list":["post-1721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-annotation-tuesday","tag-the-pitch","authors-katia-savchuk"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAt the Guardian's Long Read, no rigid formula or geographic limits - Nieman Storyboard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2018\/06\/05\/the-pitch-at-the-guardians-long-read-no-rigid-formula-or-geographic-limits\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"At the Guardian's Long Read, no rigid formula or geographic limits - Nieman Storyboard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The editor's advice: Study what's been published before. 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