“Send us a pitch and we’ll consider your work” editors tell the emerging writer.
So we spend hours, weeks, months and years…
sweating on it
drinking on it
smoking on it
getting it “just right”
Then there is the accompanying email — the writer has to worry about.
SHOULD IT BE PROFESSIONAL?
Dear Joe Bloggs,
My name is Vanessa de Largie and I am the sex columnist at Maxim Magazine. I wish to pitch you an article about blah, blah, blah
SHOULD IT BE PERSONAL?
Dear Joe Bloggs,
I wish to extend my congratulations on the recent birth of your twin daughters, Lily and Rose. I’ve always loved the thought of daughters being named after flowers….
SHOULD IT BE PERSONABLE?
Dear Joe Bloggs,
It was great to catch you last Friday at “The Oyster” and witness each other visibly trashed. I look forward to doing it again soon.
**
The truth of the matter is ALL of these pitches CAN work and NOT work depending on the editor and where they are mentally, emotionally and physically — on the day you decide to strike.
Getting a column published can lead writers to believe that if they just rinse and repeat with “said editor” — that they will get their next column published and so on.
This is not the case and as soon as you start to feel even moderately sure of yourself as the “writer of all writers” — editors will crush you with their silence, indifference or a firm “no” to whip that BIG booty (in my case anyway) into shape.
And sadly (but not surprisingly) this is where writers start shapeshifting. It’s all very well to judge a person on what they write. But maybe that writer needed to pay a bill or buy some diapers or pay their car registration. Or worse, maybe they are trying to stay relevant in a world of no-talent MAFS celebs.
Google “how to pitch an editor” and 102, 000, 000 search results will come up with a bunch of arseholes trying to sell you the magic formula. There is no magic formula.
I am guessing the sweet spot is somewhere between tenacity and that 50-million-dollar lotto jackpot I tried to win last Thursday. It’s random and none of it makes sense.
The best writers don’t win.
The worst writers don’t lose.