Magazine article

“ Magazines afford a better opportunity than do newspapers for an analysis of the different types of articles discussed in Chapter V. Since magazine articles are usually signed, it is possible to seek out and study the work of various successful authors in order to determine wherein lies the effectiveness of their writing. Beginning with the popular weekly and monthly magazines, a writer may well extend his study to those periodicals that appeal to particular classes, such as women's magazines, agricultural journals, and trade publications. ”

“ Magazine Writing.—We know not how we can better evince our appreciation of the kind and flattering comments of a Southern correspondent, who will at once recognize our allusion, than by citing the somewhat kindred remarks of an old and favorite contributor, now passed away from earth. It was a pleasing matter, he said, to sit down with the proper afflatus stirring within him, to write an article for a Magazine. ‘If the work has a general prevalence; if its fame is rife on good men’s tongues, the inspiration is the stronger. ”

“ The rise of popular magazines and of magazine sections of daily newspapers during the last thirty years has resulted in a type of writing known as the "special feature article." Such articles, presenting interesting and timely subjects in popular form, are designed to attract a class of readers that were not reached by the older literary periodicals. ”

“ The modern magazine is a distinctly new product. When the slow, thick stream of book-making first began to spread and filter out through the new channels of periodic publication, a magazine was a serious literary production. ”

“ The oldest periodical of its type, it is yet, in each new volume, a new magazine, nor simply because it presents fresh subjects and new pictures, but also, and chiefly, because it steadily advances in the method itself of magazine-making. In a word, the MAGAZINE becomes more and more the faithful mirror of current life and movement. ”

“ A magazine or a newspaper is a shop. Each is an experiment and represents a new focus, a new ratio between commerce and intellect. ”

“ But even among the few magazines which can be called first class there are wide differences of opinion as to what constitutes a good story, and a MS. which one will reject decidedly another may accept gladly. It is your first business to acquaint yourself with the general style of the magazine to which you desire to contribute ”

“ And then I'm filling that magazine with new "different" stories, daring in aspect beyond ordinary Science Fiction, more glorious by far than any predecessors.
And now, the rest of you Readers, what are you going to do with your share? As I have said, I am going to do what I want with my part even if we have to split up the magazine and pass a page all around. There's just a lot of you Readers who look at a magazine, and, because it isn't your ideal, pass it up and go down the line passing up all the magazines. ”

“ Hence, if the editor is more keenly alert for one thing than for another, it is for the new writer. The frequency of the new note in his magazine is his salvation; for just in proportion as he can introduce that new note is his success with his readers. A successful magazine is exactly like a successful store: it must keep its wares constantly fresh and varied to attract the eye and hold the patronage of its customers. ”

“ But this is not "another fiction magazine," Amazing Stories is a new kind of fiction magazine! It is entirely new—entirely different—something that has never been done before in this country. Therefore, Amazing Stories deserves your attention and interest.
There is the usual fiction magazine, the love story and the sex-appeal type of magazine, the adventure type, and so on, but a magazine of "Scientifiction" is a pioneer in its field in America. ”

“ We have maintained from the foundation of the magazine, as one of its special features, the presentation of the great personalities of our own time. By series of portraits, conversations, and character studies, we have exhibited to our readers, in his actual every-day life, at the moment when they were most interested in him, the eminent living author, artist, statesman, scientist, business man, or inventor. ”

“ It's about time for me to concede that your or "our" magazine is the best I have read. Ten issues have come into my hands and I am perfectly well satisfied with the line of fiction that you publish. I have read about fifty different magazines on the market, and I am sure that Astounding Stories is the best of them all. I have followed the magazine for seven months and that is the best amount of reading any magazine can boast for me. ”

“ As a natural result of the demand for standardization of taste and material desires came the modern magazine. The magazine with a circulation of a million or two million became not unusual. The real purpose, as everyone understands, was to create through advertising, a nation-wide demand for certain commodities. The magazines were business institutions run by business men with business ends in view. ”

“ They even publish a magazine in our language—or in what they confidently believe to be such—which is certainly amusing, and in its way instructive, for it shows the utter hopelessness of our becoming intelligible to them. ”

“ It is a well-known fact among successful magazine editors that their most striking successes have been made by material to which unknown names were attached, where the material was fresh, the approach new, the note different. That is what builds up a magazine; the reader learns to have confidence in what he finds in the periodical, whether it bears a famous name or not. ”

“ I have often thought how interesting a magazine paper might be written by any author who would—that is to say, who could—detail, step by step, the processes by which any one of his compositions attained its ultimate point of completion. ”

“ But the first impression a magazine creates is very often decisive and prophetic of its future destiny. If so, The Masses must already be considered an overwhelming success. The readers are of course the final arbiters of the fortunes of a magazine, and the readers have received The Masses with instantaneous favor. ”

“ It gives fiction that is varied and original and verse that is worth reading, and it is besides a guide to the best literature of the day. It is not a periodical of protest or smartness, but a magazine that stands for energy, honesty and accomplishment. ”

“ We shall explore conditions at home and abroad. We shall make this magazine, fearlessly and in the white light of to-day, as nearly the magazine of the century as courage and devotion and eyes that see and minds that shrink not can do. ”

“ What it means is that "production" for me, as aforesaid, means production of the little book, pure and simple—independent of any antecedent appearance; and, truth to tell, now that I wholly see that, and have at last accepted it, I am, incongruously, not at all sorry. I am indeed very serene. I have always hated the magazine form, magazine conditions and manners, and much of the magazine company. I hate the hurried little subordinate part that one plays in the catchpenny picture-book—and the negation of all literature that the insolence of the picture-book imposes. ”

“ I like your magazine. By this, I do not mean that it is the best Science Fiction periodical, for it assuredly is not; but it is the most reliable. I am sure when I pick up your magazine that I shall find therein consistently interesting stories. I have yet to find a story that failed to hold my attention; on the other hand, I have yet to find a masterpiece. Of all the Editors, you have shown yourself the shrewdest judge of public taste, but also the least interested in the advancement of Science Fiction. ”

“ On the generally accepted assumption that each sold copy of a popular magazine eventually reaches an average of five persons, [Pg 62] there is one forum in the magazine world of America which every week assembles a throng of ten million or more assorted citizens, gathered from everywhere, coast to coast, men and women, young and old, every walk of life. ”

“ If I insist a little upon the high office which this modern form of publication fulfils in the literary world, it is because I am impatient of the antiquated and ignorant prejudice which classes the magazines as ephemeral. They are ephemeral in form, but in substance they are not ephemeral, and what is best in them awaits its resurrection in the book, which, as the first form, is so often a lasting death. An interesting proof of the value of the magazine to literature is the fact that a good novel will often have wider acceptance as a book from having been a magazine serial. ”

“ Nothing can be more absurd; and the history of the leading penny commercial and weekly papers in large cities attests this. In magazines the world does not take unfledged genius and untried promises at par. The magazine world—by which we mean that part of the world that reads magazines—has grown cautious, cute, shrewd, or whatever may happen to be the choicest phrase to designate a careful squint into the “bag” before “buying the pig.” ”

“ There is a certain type of magazine which publishes the most alluring pictures of food, salads and desserts, even a table with the implements laid out ready for canning peaches, that holds a fatal fascination for [Pg 188] me. I have even noticed J—— looking at one with interest. When my father comes out to visit us every spring, the truck gardens, the packing houses, and the cost of living here, I think, affect him in much the same way that those magazines do me, and I wonder if every one, except a dyspeptic, doesn't secretly like to hear and see these very things! ”

“ Do people like a magazine if three-fourths of it are filled with pious stuff? Anyway pay special attention to the magazine. Mentally take it as though I were not. Act independently on this basis. "We depend on the elder brother for money, learning, everything" — such an attitude is the road to ruin. If all the money even for the magazine is to be collected by me and all the articles too are from my pen — what will you all do? ”

“ I use no figure of speech when I say that we may now buy our books in bulk. I saw, only this morning, the advertisement of a large dry goods “emporium” (’tis laces and literature now) wherein is announced for sale the bound volumes of a popular magazine. “Over eight pounds of the choicest reading, bound in the usual style—olive green.” ”

“ A novel, however, may be very clever and yet hardly suit a magazine. Should it be accepted by the ‘Olympus,’ some time must elapse before it appears. The Editor would be very happy to see Miss de Montmorenci if it would suit her to call any Friday between the hours of two and three. ”

“ Our stories are unlike any you have ever read—or perhaps ever will read—in the other magazines. They are unusual, uncanny, unparalleled. We have no space in WEIRD TALES for the “average magazine story.” Unless a story is an extraordinary thing, we won’t consider it. ”

“ The young author who wins recognition in a first-class magazine has achieved a double success, first, with the editor, and then with the best reading public. Many factitious and fallacious literary reputations have been made through books, but very few have been made through the magazines, which are not only the best means of living, but of outliving, with the author; they are both bread and fame to him. ”

“ We appreciate this, and shall do our best to carry it to the satisfaction of our readers, and though this, our first number, is but a modest attempt at some of the things at which we aim — to establish a magazine that will be a fit representative of the young and virile West, a magazine of literature, art, education and progress, a record of our unique history and traditions — we believe that it will be received with encouragement and commendation. ”

“ For instance, in the June issue, one Warren Williams of Chicago, suggests that you enlarge the magazine and give each story a full-page illustration, like other Science Fiction periodicals. Mr. Williams evidently favors standardization. As one magazine is, so must the rest be. Please ignore this request, and others like it. Astounding Stories is different, unique; just keep it that way, and you will never lack a host of satisfied readers. ”

“ And Alfred Yule himself had noticed that paper in The Wayside. That’s how things work, you know; reputation comes with a burst, just when you’re not looking for anything of the kind.’
‘What’s the new magazine to be called?’ asked Amy. ”

“ I have read every one of your Astounding Stories and think there is no other magazine on the market like it. Only one kick: it doesn't appear often enough. I should like to see it every week; every two weeks, anyway. I like every story you print, and I think the size of your magazine is perfect. I have saved every issue I read, and now have seventeen of them.
"Phalanxes of Atlans" and "Marooned Under the Sea" were especially good. "The Readers' Corner" is fine, but I don't like so many brickbats thrown. ”

“ We are about to exhibit to our countrymen a new monthly collection, to which the well-deserved popularity of the first undertaking of this kind, has now made it almost necessary to prefix the name of Magazine. There are, already, many such periodical compilations, of which we do not envy the reception, nor shall dispute the excellence. If the nature of things would allow us to indulge our wishes, we should desire to advance our own interest, without lessening that of any other ”