Newswriting

M ost books for journalists assume that news is what journalism is about and avariety of definitions of news are accordingly offered. A book about maga-zine journalism doesn’t need to repeat these since in general magazines are not in competition with the other news media to be first with anything. They sometimes are but that’s not usually their prime aim. Trade or professional publications may well bring new knowledge to their subscribers – a new product or a new surgical technique – but it seems to matter less whether this information is exclusive. Magazines and periodicals are likely to be less urgent in their approach, and all the better for it, as Martha Gellhorn, legendary war correspondent and writer of news, features and fiction, believed. ‘The trouble with writing for any newspaper is lack of space: I feel as if I am talking at top speed in one breath’ (Gellhorn 1989: 171). Something of the same works for readers who may feel, as they read a magazine piece, that they are not being hustled from one point to the next with quite the haste that a newspaper report would employ.