From Russia with love

Front cover of Russian magazine: inside is my article

Early in my career, I wrote an article about how I, a freelance writer, went about trying to sell articles  to magazines.

A publication called The Australian Author picked it up, and then it was reprinted in the Russian magazine pictured above.

And that's how I went public, both in Australia and later in Russia, on the folly of putting your writing about.

Here's how my article read in Russian.

Page one with my byline in Russian

page two (upper area) of my article

You can see that these pages of close print have an academic authority, and I think you should be impressed.  No need to read on.  Just skip to the end and leave an admiring comment.

  

TRANSLATION OF MY STORY ABOUT SELLING ARTICLES: Russian into Australian 

For those who are not fluent in Russian, and insist on knowing what I, an unknown freelance writer, could possibly say that might interest a serious Russian readership, please read on.
(NB: All comments in brackets are my speculation on how Russian readers might react.)



I opened the article with a witty (take my word for it) spiel about how I develop a story and ready it for publication (NB: this story is pre-email).

Then I continue...


The articles I really like are sent out to magazines.  They are my babies.  It hurts to send them out to the big critical world, but I am firm with them, and they leave with a stamped return envelope.

Cleo, Women's Weekly and Woman's Day are usually insultingly swift, and invariably return my articles within seven days.  I cannot help but feel they have not read them.

(NB: at this point, Russian readers could be out of the loop, as they did not, at that time, have such indulgent magazines.)

Other magazines keep the articles longer, and this gives reason to hope.  No doubt, I feel, they are considering them, chuckling over them, writing out the cheque.  But no.  They are just at the bottom of a high heap of other hopeful articles, waiting for some overworked editor to cast them a cursory glance.

My first and only fiction was a well-travelled story.  It first went to Cleo, then Cosmopolitan, National Times, then languished for three months with Nation Review. 

I considered that they had had ample time to read it, so I phoned Nation Review.  After much searching and shuffling of paper, it received 'conditional acceptance' from the Features Editor.  

This would have been cause for celebration, except 'conditional acceptance' meant it would be published when there was space available.  The Features Editor reckoned on around three years.

(As Russian plays are often based on the surreal, Russian readers are now on the same page.)

He recommended I try and sell it elsewhere, and he requested more of my writing. I complied, and sent him two articles.  

After another three months' silence, I phoned him, and asked about the articles.  He shuffled more papers and, in a bored tone, said that he received many such 'essays' and no, he did not think he would use them.  And he never bothered to send them back.

(The Russians are now in my corner.)

Anyway, Forum bought the story.   Paid me $50.  Published it without changing a word, with my name spelt right in big letters.

One step forward.  Two steps back.  An environmental magazine wrote to accept three of my articles.  Then followed another to say no, they had not accepted the articles, but were 'holding them' and I was free to sell them elsewhere.

(Shades of the Revolution!)

Then a new magazine came on the market called Working Woman.  I sent them an article.  The editor accepted it for a magazine in her Practical Planning Series and would I write a follow-up article.  Would I!

I did, and earned $125 for the two articles.  I contributed four articles to Working Woman and they were held pending the next issue.  But the magazine folded.  Pilot sales in America were insufficient to warrant any success in Australia.  So my four unpublished waifs came home.

(Thus proving to my Russian readers that Australia is just another shambling democracy.)

Another new magazine came out, under the wing of Forum, called New Times.  I felt it might consider my style, so I sent an article to them.  But, after three issues, sales were insufficient and it too ceased publication.

I now suspect that my articles have a fatal effect on magazines.  I plan to smuggle some into the offices of Women's Weekly, Cleo and Woman's Day - to hide them where they can exercise their lethal influence.

I always say, if you can't join 'em, beat 'em!

(No comment.)

With thanks to The Australia Author, quarterly journal of the Australian Society of Authors, 1978