Kavey

Hi Friends <BR> <BR>As a few of you might know, I am trying to learn how to write more interestingly about my travel trips, and to that end I have been workig really hard on the Africa safari trip reports. <BR> <BR>I thought I might be able to get some published in some small local magasine with a view to stepping on to bigger and better ones. Not necc for the money, I have a job which pays just about OK, but for the excitement. <BR> <BR>Being a community of avid travellers who seek out the unusual and the different and the special, I wondered if anyone else has thought to become a published travel writer and how it has gone for you? <BR> <BR>I know Tony is writing his story of his epic journey to the US up which he hopes to sell. <BR> <BR>Anyone else? Do we have any published travel writers here? I know we had that good looking bloke who did a story on mother's day but that wasnt really travel based. <BR> <BR>Also, if anyone else will join Sheila on honest and critical feedback (I need the negative feedback to be able to improve) then please read what I have done so far o Africa forum and let me know via email which bits stink. <BR> <BR>

StCirq

Kavey: <BR> <BR>I've published quite a few travel articles. The best place to start is with small newspapers, then work your way up to larger newspapers and magazines. Get yourself a copy of the Writer's Digest publication called "Writer's Markets." It comes out yearly. There are also specialized books on travel writing you can find at Borders, B&N, etc., though I've never found them to be terribly illuminating.I wouldn't bother with internet publications - the pay's ridiculous and the quality pretty uniformly poor. Writer's Market will explain everything you need to know about how to approach editors, prepare submissions, etc. Good luck (and you're smart not to count on it for your "real income").

Gerry K

Kavey, <BR> <BR>Over the past 25+ years, I've written hundreds of magazine articles on a wide range of subjects, including travel. These have appeared in quite a few American publications, such as Travel/Holiday, Field & Stream, The Saturday Evening Post, etc. If you have any specific questions that I can answer for you, I'd be glad to do so. Just e-mail me at the above address. <BR> <BR>Cheers, <BR> <BR>(mr) Gerry K

Escritora

I'm a professional writer (escritora means writer in Spanish) and have been publishing articles for more than 20 years. While I wouldn't discourage anyone from trying to become a better writer, I do think we have to make clear distinctions between the professionals and the hobbyists. This is in no way meant to disparage your writing or its suitability for publication. However, I do caution you strongly against the rampant "money isn't important--I just think it would be fun to be published" line of thinking, which ultimately diminishes both the quality of writing that does get published and the quality of income of those of us who do earn our livings this way. <BR> <BR>Again, these are not intended as words of discouragement against your either writing or publishing--just against your doing it for the excitement. Aspire to write not only interestingly but also professionally and I'll be delighted to see your work in print. <BR> <BR>As far as travel writing in particular is concerned, you're attempting to scale the steepest slope in journalism there. Everyone would like to do travel writing. To produce stories that sell, you need to come up with a unique angle, which probably means zeroing in on some small unique incident or experience rather than a full-blown travelogue, because there's probably no place on Earth you've explored that some more experienced and better-connected writer hasn't beaten you to. (A few months before my trip to the Galapagos last year, the New York Times ran a piece about the Galapagos by an Oscar-winning screenwriter. I have published two pieces about the Galapagos--but not in the Times!) Often the best angle on a travel story is not the travel angle itself. For example, an African safari story could explore how the rise in tourism has reduced threats to endangered species by providing tourist related jobs to people who previously relied on hunting. (I'm guessing about that--it's true in the Galapagos, where sea life is thriving as more former fishermen have begun using their boats to take tourists around.) A piece about African cuisine for the food section of your local paper would be another way to sneak into travel writing through a side door. Then you can build features of a travelogue around the framework of that story and start to develop your credentials for straight-on travel writing. <BR> <BR>Finally, as StCirq noted, start small--both in the articles you write and the magazines or papers you target. I wish you luck with your work and hope you find it rewarding!

Linda

Kavey, as a fellow traveler (OK, so I'm not a published writer, but I do have a lot ofexperience in the reading end), and since nobody else has yet volunteered to provide feedback on what you have written, I'd be very happy to provide feedback. I have done some editing work before and would be happy to help. So far, I've had a great time reading your postings and I think writing about your travels would be a great way to celebrate and remember them. My e-mail is not fake, so please feel free. <BR> <BR>Linda

xxxx

The information provided by Escritora is extremely helpful, but he/she definitely made some interesting points regarding the content of travel articles. In my humble opinion, I often find travel articles focusing too much on the serious side, regarding the author finding themselves or exploring remote areas of a country or out of the way village that the normal traveler will never visit. I'm not saying I don't like these types of articles, but sometimes I would like to read something that isn't quite as heavy or deep. Reading light-hearted travel stories are a lot of fun and it helps me to "escape" for one brief moment in time. Sometimes times it is better not think too much and just enjoy reading. <BR> <BR>All that said, Kavey, I thoroughly enjoyed reading your African travel journal. <BR> <BR>The reader, not writer viewpoint.

Dr. Betty

This is good. The advice offered can be generalized to article writing for various genres. Writing is one of the most therapeutic and rewarding challenges that one could undertake, perhaps because it demands honesty. Writing distills one's experience and like a photograph, where images gradually appear in the processing solution, our memories and sensations are brought to light in our writing. <BR>Write on, <BR>Dr. Betty

kam

Kavey, a question I have often pondered. The thing I've seen from reading your posts here is your incredible enthusiatic attitude! You are so upbeat that I think you could make me love almost any itinerary. I say go for it. I'd love to read what you've written. Oh....and have a great visit to SF--I wish I could be there to meet you.

Escritora

This information, cut & pasted from the Rough Guides writer guidelines, might give you some additional insight and publishing prospects. Sorry if there are any formatting glitches! <BR> <BR>Thinking of breaking into travel writing? The best advice we can give about launching a career in travel writing is to start small. Established travel magazines and guidebook publishers typically won't consider you for projects unless you have relevant experience and clips that attest to your ability to write and research. But local newspapers and smaller magazines are often strapped for travel content, and might throw an assignment or two your way even if you're just starting out. There are also some start-ups aimed at a young travel market, such as Outpost, Trips, Blue, and these publications may be willing to accept work from people with relatively little writing experience. <BR> <BR>Rough Guides is always on the lookout for good new writers and researchers, and is keen to take on board curious travellers capable of digging out the most arcane information. An obsessive eye for detail is also a great bonus. We keep a file of all potential contributors, which we dip into as and when the need arises. Please send us some samples of your writing, along with 1000 words or so on a place you know well, in what you consider to be Rough Guide style. It would also be useful to know of any specific areas you feel most inclined to write about. If suitable, we can add your details to the file.

Escritora

Didn't mean to hog the discussion here, but this one is CRITICALLY IMPORTANT for anyone who has posted travelogues here and wonders if they could be sold and published. This is from the Fodors.com copyright statement. <BR> <BR>"The Web site contains copyrighted material, trademarks and other proprietary information including, but not limited to, text, software, photos, video, graphics, music and sound, and the entire contents of the Web site are copyrighted as a collective work under the United States copyright laws. The Online Service Provider owns and/or controls copyright in the selection, coordination, arrangement and enhancement of such content, as well as in the content original to it. Subscriber may not modify, publish, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale, create derivative works, or in any way exploit, any of the content, in whole or in part..." <BR> <BR>Based on my experience with publishers and my knowledge of contract law, I must interpret this as meaning that any content YOU WRITE and contribute to this site becomes the legal property of Random House, which owns and operates Fodors.com, and if you later sell a travelogue that you wrote and first posted here you are violating the company's copyright and ownership of that material. <BR> <BR>Perhaps Fodor's can clarify this point?

Kavey

Firstly thanks so much for all your advice… <BR> <BR>To all who have already published (STCirq, Gerry, Escritora), would you be willing to share your articles with me? I have no intention of plagiarising in any way, but I would like to learn about the kinds of articles which sell and would be interested to look at different styles and presentation. <BR> <BR>StCirq, I have been looking at a lot of online groups for writers and travel writers and the problem for me is that they are all American. This isn’t a major problem as I can still learn a lot, but the advice on actually getting published will be geared very much to American publications, and I would imagine there are some little differences to how the publishers work here and there. <BR> <BR>Escritora. Although I can understand where you are coming from in your advice not to consider writing for the sheer fun of it, I have to disagree. From the way you have expressed yourself I can see two main reasonings to your advice – 1) there is a little element of protectionism going on – if the amateurs start getting into the act and actually get paid and published, this dilutes the available work, and income for the “pro” or full-time writers. I do appreciate the point but at the end of the day, if my work is good enough to publish then it deserves to be published whether or not I am relying on it for income. I should add I am not ruling out a change in career but admitting that it is unlikely I can produce in the quantity and quality required to do this. 2) You have probably seen a large volume of poor quality amateur writing and are worried about the impact this might be having on the overall image and reputation of travel writers. I should say then, that I am very hard on myself, and have no intention of publishing anything which I don’t feel is the best I can make it, and good enough for the publication in question. <BR> <BR>Right now I do not aspire to publish professionally (if by this, you mean make it my full time career) but I do aspire to write interestingly and to publish. However, my idea of writing “professionally” is to produce work which, in its quality, cannot be distinguished from articles written by writers doing this for a living. I appreciate my early work won’t be that good, but I am a quick learner. I have been writing in one manner for quite a while. I produce very detailed and clear training manuals for the training courses I create, and this has already honed my communication skills and writing skills. My feeling then is that I am not completely new to writing, but very very new to writing in this arena, which is a very different thing to technical educational writing. <BR>

Kavey

I very much the advice to start small. I cannot compete for the longer articles and series of articles written by experienced pros with great portfolios and established styles. I think my main chance of success lies in writing small succinct pieces which magazines may find useful as fillers next to longer articles in their travel sections. <BR> <BR>This is also the advice I have found on all the travel writing websites I have been reading. <BR> <BR>Linda, many thanks for your volunteering. Let me come back to that in a moment. <BR> <BR>xxxx I also appreciate your comments and can see where you are coming from. I am hoping to be able to get a little humour in occasionally, and some stories which are from the viewpoint of an ordinary traveller and how they have dealt with various issues which affect ordinary people when in that destination. Sometimes I do feel some travel articles are written with a little too much emphasis on how sophisticated and worldly wise the writer is, and this can be a little alienating to the normal person who is reading for an escape or to be motivated about their own upcoming travels. Whilst I enjoy the articles written by people on 10 month sabbaticals in Borneo I don’t identify as much with them as with the articles which show me a destination I can go to myself on holiday in a new light or articles which inspire me in some way. I will keep this in mind as I continue to pull articles out of my safari experience. <BR> <BR>I also like the idea of giving the article a particular slant, this is something which has come across very strongly in the advice sites I have been reading, and I have already started looking at ideas to slant articles to a food interest angle or conservation of animals angle or other. <BR> <BR>Kam, thank you! I am always enthusiastic about my travels and I am so pleased that you are finding that coming through in my writing. My aim now is to move away from simple records of what I have done on the holiday (like my France and Spain trip reports) and look more at taking only a few of the elements of the trip which have interest and weaving an article around them. I am still new to this and very much on the learning curve. <BR> <BR>Re the last point which Escritora makes about copyright on this site: Damn! I think I will be OK regarding the two articles I have already published here on the Africa forum as they were previously in existence and “out there” in the public domain as they had already been sent out to a variety of friends, family and colleagues. I will keep my head down and claim them back as I was certainly not aware the Forum content would also be covered by copyright. It does mean though that I am now not going to publish any of the remaining diary I write here on this site, which I think is a crying shame, unless I can get some feedback from Fodors that content on the Forums is not subject to the same rules. What I will do instead is put them onto a simple personal website and post the URL here. <BR> <BR>Linda I have therefore taken your email address and will post to you any safari stuff I need feedback on. <BR> <BR>Thank you so much to all who are giving their advice, ALL of it is very much appreciated. <BR>

s.fowler

Escritota -- while I agree that forums such as this are a potentially gray area in copyright law, from what I understand [and I'm not a legal beagle] the clause you posted applies to the content Fodors posts to this site. For example, I can't copy THEIR description of a hotel, but I retain the right to MY description that I may have posted here. I did read the clause carefully and while it COULD be interpreted in the manner you propose, it could also be interpreted in the manner I propose. To be honest I'm not sure that Fodors ever envisaged the forum becoming the hot-bed of good writing that it is! <BR> <BR>Given the recent court case concerning freelancers and web content I doubt that Fodor's would pursue any of us for content for which they have not paid. It wouldn't be worth the negative publicity. <BR> <BR>We probably should ask Fodors about this situation though to get things clarified as the web has changed the way copyright is thought of -- But in both legal and practical terms I don't think Kavey or any other poster has anything to worry about.

StCirq

Kavey: <BR> <BR>I assume the e-mail address you use here is your real one? If so, I'd be happy to send you a few articles I have had published. They will attest to Escritora's point that you really have to have an "angle" and not just write up your travel experiences. As for finding markets other than the American ones, I do believe Writer's Markets now includes extensive information on publications outside the USA. And any good bookstore (and goodness knows you have 'em there in the UK) should have considerable resouces for writers. Every newspaper and magazine will have its own writer's guidelines, which will specify exactly what they are looking for in terms of content as well as the format of your submissions. Here in the US, most will also specify what "style" they are looking for (e.g., many require writers to follow the guidelines of the Chicago Manual of Style, a sort of Bible for publishing that specifies what gets capitalized, what gets hyphenated, how references are treated, etc.). It's wise to know exactly what the publisher is looking for before even querying with an idea. It's also wise to write for those publications you know well and read often. Otherwise, it's essential to study a publication in detail before making a submission.

Kavey

Hi StCirq <BR> <BR>My address is the one above in this post, minus the Moos. (I add them in the probably naive belief that it will foil the automatic gopher bots which mine forums for email addresses for mailing lists! <BR> <BR>I have heard reference to the Style book you speak of and will be looking for it (or another which is always mentioned with it) this weekend. <BR> <BR>I would love to see some of your articles, thanks so much for your support. <BR> <BR>Kavita

steve

You might try small, special interest magazines. I have had 3 bicycling travel articles published over the years, mainly because I didn't like the information (or lack of) in the articles that I had read in those publications. I think I received $25 for the first article. The last was written 15 years later and I received $350

Gerry K

Kavey, <BR> <BR> I'm not computer savvy enough to transmit my articles to you that way, but if you would like to e-mail your address to me, I'll be glad to snail mail some copies your way. <BR> <BR> Good luck, and go for it. The journey to publication is a joyous one in and of itself. <BR> <BR>Cheers, <BR> <BR>(mr) Gerry K

Escritora

More on copyrights. <BR> <BR>First, good thought on providing only links to your articles on the Fodor's board. The first thing you have to do if you want to publish is to become sophisticated about your rights as author. I do believe the ENTIRE Fodor's site is copyrighted, and if you read the Subscriber's Agreement you'll see that you have agreed to this by virtue of your using the site. Intellectual property law is interesting business and varies widely by country. The family of Pablo Picasso, for example, is absurdly protective of the Picasso name. One of the world's largest software companies (yeah, that one) was sued by the Picasso family about 5 years ago for running an ad with a headline saying it was "the Picasso of software developers". Under New York law, this case would have no legs, but the suit was filed in the French courts, where it WAS within the framework of the law. Moreover, intellectual property rights in the US are protected by laws that vary state by state. <BR> <BR>"Public domain" does not refer to works that have been circulated personally to friends and family. It refers to work whose copyright has expired. The poems of Robert Burns, for example, have passed into the public domain; anyone may publish a collection of them and will not owe royalties to Burns' heirs. So saying your work is in the public domain is both incorrect and, more important, not in your interest! <BR> <BR>But surely there are some lawyers among the regulars who can either confirm the "legal opinions" of this writer and onetime paralegal or can assure the folks here that I'm nuts? <BR>

Art

Sinc I kant spel worth a dam, iv never considerd triing to rite profesonly. <BR>

s.fowler

Oh Art -- you're such a sweetie <BR> <BR>I wrote Kavey off forum: the [unprofessional] advice I gave her was not to post any FINISHED work here. Not because Fodors would claim it. I still hold that they would be very unlikely to, given the bad publicity [and death of the forums] that would ensue -- these forums are very good PR for them -- even if they can't make money from them directly. <BR> <BR>The reason I suggested to Kavey that she not post any finshed work here is that the publisher to whom she submits it might well consider posting here a form of prior publication. <BR> <BR>Again perhaps we need to ask Fodors for a clarification of these points.