{"id":2711,"date":"2009-01-14T20:14:02","date_gmt":"2009-01-14T20:14:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=2711"},"modified":"2009-01-14T20:14:02","modified_gmt":"2009-01-14T20:14:02","slug":"freelance-writing-q-and-a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2009\/01\/14\/freelance-writing-q-and-a\/","title":{"rendered":"Freelance Writing Q and A"},"content":{"rendered":"

QUESTION<\/strong>
\nIn a recent post on her blog travelingtastebuds.blogspot.com<\/strong><\/a> (“Growing Pains<\/a>“) Devon Brown (Tokyo-to, 2002-04) describes a situation where she submitted a travel writing piece to an editor (her first hit with a national publication) only to see a published version that looked rather different than what she submitted, in rhythm and voice.<\/p>\n

She wonders:\u00a0 Is this normal or typical?\u00a0 Or is this just what she should expect?<\/p>\n

<\/strong>JetWit.com put the question to JET alumni in the Writers Interpreters Translators (WIT) Group.<\/p>\n

Click “Read More” to read their responses.<\/h3>\n

ANSWERS<\/strong>
\n**************
\nI’ve taken some freelance writing seminars with top-notch freelancers who are making 6-figures– and they all said you kind of have to sell yourself when you begin to write for the big glossy magazines– they all have their own distinct style.<\/p>\n

*************
\nIn my experience, unfortunately, it is very common to have an article heavily edited, completely change, and\/or utterly destroyed. I’ve even heard of articles being pitched and then the idea handed off to a friend of the editor. I’d say that if the writer got the piece published, got a byline, and got paid, then she did better than she can expect in most situations. Freelancing is a tough racket. That said, I know some writers who have had much better experiences than I have, and a few who’ve had worse.
\n************
\nI think it is normal to have your pieces edited unless you have a clause in your contract. I would suggest that she asks the publisher for a final check before publishing, or if the final version was not the kind of tone\/writing style she wishes to convey, then don’t work with that publisher again. Normally, you should get a chance to look over your work once everything has been laid out. At that time, you should voice your concerns about change in tone\/text.<\/p>\n

(Sorry, I should have written this in proper order, but I’m writing from my crackberry!)
\n***********
\nResponding to the question if Devon should be shocked that her “voice” was changed for the national publication — no. Especially national, glossy magazines, they have their own voice and rhythm. Even for small local newspapers, editors can devour articles– yet the difference is, usually at a small paper, the editor will take the time to go over the article with the writer… but for the big magazines — think Vogue, Glamour… They all have a specific voice and style of writing that every article must follow (especially if they’re paying you a $1\/word). I’m not sure which magazine you wrote for, but that’s my take on it. I was a freelance writer in Tokyo for a couple years. In Japan, the editors are\u00a0a bit nicer– while they may change something, they almost always send me a copy of it before it appears in print. Too bad all editors aren’t that nice… \u00a0 Good luck! And congrats on getting published in a national magazine. That’s a huge deal…
\n***********
\nHey, I have to say, in some cases this is common.\u00a0 It’s only happened to me once, with something I wrote a while ago, and the editor totally changed the “feel” of the article.\u00a0 Granted the same information got through, but it was totally different.\u00a0 My second cousin is an author, and she told me of the experience with her first book where her editor would have her rewrite and totally change whole pages.\u00a0 She called it “getting her babies killed.”\u00a0 A disturbing way of putting it, but when one thinks of your ideas as precious, then it makes sense.\u00a0 She said that eventually she realized the editor wasn’t exactly disliking her work, he was just thinking more along the lines of the end product, and the audience to receive it, and then in the end she learned to “kill her own babies.”\u00a0 I try to keep that in mind when someone edits my work in a way I don’t like either.
\n*************
\nI haven’t done too much freelance writing as I mostly translate, but I did have this happen once with a piece I wrote for local magazine.
\nGranted I wrote in Japanese and needed to be edited, so it is slightly different.<\/p>\n

But as a translator I have learned not to get miffed at editing.<\/p>\n

Perhaps not very helpful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

QUESTION In a recent post on her blog travelingtastebuds.blogspot.com (“Growing Pains“) Devon Brown (Tokyo-to, 2002-04) describes a situation where she submitted a travel writing piece to an editor (her first hit with a national publication) only to see a published version that looked rather different than what she submitted, in rhythm and voice. She wonders:\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[73,7,10,1,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advice","category-blogs","category-career","category-uncategorized","category-writers"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkZ7m-HJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2711"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2713,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711\/revisions\/2713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}