1 hr 8 min
Dave Herndon: How to Tell Your Story What Has My Attention
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- Philosophy
If you want to be a better writer, this episode is for you.
My guest Dave Herndon is an accomplished non-fiction editor and writer, with nearly 40 years of experience at quality newspapers and magazines. We asked him for a few writing tips, which turn out to be good advice for delivering information and storytelling regardless of medium or platform. Dave stresses the importance of outlines, so here’s a somewhat shrunken version of his outline.
Ask yourself the most important question: Who cares? What’s your story in a nutshell? How are you going to tell your story? DO AN OUTLINE! Identify key elements of story: The lead/intro; the nutshell; the body; scenes, characters, quotes, key info, etc. Herndon refers to a famous example in this outline, Gay Talese’s storyboard for a famous profile of Frank Sinatra. And here’s the final piece, Frank Sinatra Has a Cold. Write like a craftsperson--assemble the pieces as you outlined them--and let the art take care of itself, in the process of rewriting/self-editing. Take it from the likes of Tom Wolfe and Ernest Hemingway: set a reasonable quota for a day, and stop hard when you reach it. Wolfe set himself a quota of 1,000 words a day. That doesn’t mean you have to. The next day, self-edit the stuff you wrote the day before and pick up in the midstream. Herndon referred to two examples of craftsmanship that represent solutions to different interviewing/writing problems. He wrote a piece about Ted Turner, A Turning Point in Turner Country, but only had 20 minutes with TT. See how he deployed a scant inventory of quotes to create the impression that Turner himself is helping to tell this story.
Another piece had the opposite issue: Herndon had lots of access to the subject--who died while he was writing it. So the story had to change in mid-process, with the stakes raised considerably. The piece is titled, The Voice of the People, about Andy Palacio.
Links Mentioned In This Episode Gay Talese Outlines His Famous 1966 Profile “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” on a Shirt Board Frank Sinatra Has a Cold A Turning Point in Turner Country The Voice of the People Insight Meditation (Vipassana) Kate Reynolds, The Santa Fe Center for Mindfulness Kelle Rae Oien, International Nia Teacher & Trainer Contact Dave Herndon Herndon-at-Large.com
herndonatlarge@gmail.com
HELP US SPREAD THE WORD We’d love it if you’d please share #WhatHasMyAttention with your twitter followers. Click here to post a tweet!
If you want to let other people know about this episode, head on over to Apple Podcasts and kindly leave us a rating, a review and subscribe!
WHAT has YOUR attention? Let us know Email Us
Visit JohnBiethan.com then Podchaser to see what I’m listening to and my portfolio.
My podcast page is here: WhatHasMyAttention.com
Music Credits Dope Digging by Martijn de Boer (NiGiD) (c) copyright 2020 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial (3.0) license.
If you want to be a better writer, this episode is for you.
My guest Dave Herndon is an accomplished non-fiction editor and writer, with nearly 40 years of experience at quality newspapers and magazines. We asked him for a few writing tips, which turn out to be good advice for delivering information and storytelling regardless of medium or platform. Dave stresses the importance of outlines, so here’s a somewhat shrunken version of his outline.
Ask yourself the most important question: Who cares? What’s your story in a nutshell? How are you going to tell your story? DO AN OUTLINE! Identify key elements of story: The lead/intro; the nutshell; the body; scenes, characters, quotes, key info, etc. Herndon refers to a famous example in this outline, Gay Talese’s storyboard for a famous profile of Frank Sinatra. And here’s the final piece, Frank Sinatra Has a Cold. Write like a craftsperson--assemble the pieces as you outlined them--and let the art take care of itself, in the process of rewriting/self-editing. Take it from the likes of Tom Wolfe and Ernest Hemingway: set a reasonable quota for a day, and stop hard when you reach it. Wolfe set himself a quota of 1,000 words a day. That doesn’t mean you have to. The next day, self-edit the stuff you wrote the day before and pick up in the midstream. Herndon referred to two examples of craftsmanship that represent solutions to different interviewing/writing problems. He wrote a piece about Ted Turner, A Turning Point in Turner Country, but only had 20 minutes with TT. See how he deployed a scant inventory of quotes to create the impression that Turner himself is helping to tell this story.
Another piece had the opposite issue: Herndon had lots of access to the subject--who died while he was writing it. So the story had to change in mid-process, with the stakes raised considerably. The piece is titled, The Voice of the People, about Andy Palacio.
Links Mentioned In This Episode Gay Talese Outlines His Famous 1966 Profile “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” on a Shirt Board Frank Sinatra Has a Cold A Turning Point in Turner Country The Voice of the People Insight Meditation (Vipassana) Kate Reynolds, The Santa Fe Center for Mindfulness Kelle Rae Oien, International Nia Teacher & Trainer Contact Dave Herndon Herndon-at-Large.com
herndonatlarge@gmail.com
HELP US SPREAD THE WORD We’d love it if you’d please share #WhatHasMyAttention with your twitter followers. Click here to post a tweet!
If you want to let other people know about this episode, head on over to Apple Podcasts and kindly leave us a rating, a review and subscribe!
WHAT has YOUR attention? Let us know Email Us
Visit JohnBiethan.com then Podchaser to see what I’m listening to and my portfolio.
My podcast page is here: WhatHasMyAttention.com
Music Credits Dope Digging by Martijn de Boer (NiGiD) (c) copyright 2020 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial (3.0) license.
1 hr 8 min