The Writer's Place: Interview with Steven Beschloss

"Be sure to take risks to stay fresh.
You never know what doors you can open."

Steven Beschloss

This month's focus is ?Open to Opportunity Week"? the importance for writers to be willing to explore new opportunities as a way to expand their abilities and experience. In other words, get out of our writing ruts and learn something new. And that is why I have asked Steven Beschloss to share his experiences with us. Beschloss is an award-winning writer, journalist and filmmaker who has also worked on the other side of the desk, so to speak, having also served as Managing Executive Editor for The Ritz-Carlton Magazine.

And, as the line goes on numerous infomercials, "But wait! There's more!" Add in a nomination for a Pulitzer Prize, Journalist of the Year award in Virginia, and a magazine writing award by the American Society of Journalists and Authors and a featured guest on MSNBC and Fox Business. And if that isn't enough, Beschloss is also the co-author of the Adrift: Charting Our Course Back to a Great Nation. (For more about Beschloss, visit his website.)

Bottom line? He is not a man to let an opportunity to pass him by, which makes him the perfect source and ideal inspiration for the rest of us!

Tell us a little about yourself. How long have you been engaged in the writing profession?
I have been writing for a living for nearly three decades. That?s included writing for newspapers, magazines, movies, books, you name it. Sometimes that?s hard to believe, since I still wake up every day wondering what stories and ideas are compelling enough to pursue. This has always felt like a quest to me, an adventure into the unknown, which is a key reason why this work has never lost its excitement. When the writing is going well, I take an almost childlike pleasure in choosing words and crafting sentences.

My first full-time job was as a feature writer for the Sunday pages of a small daily newspaper in western Pennsylvania, where I wrote about everything from the collapse of the steel industry there to profiles of a local milkman and a train engineer to features about gospel music, Native Americans and George Orwell.? That experience probably set a tone for my career--delving into diverse subject matter with an eye to creating a good read.?

I subsequently was a freelancer for The New York Times and The Chicago Tribune, writing from their London bureaus. After several years, I came back to the US and worked as a special projects writer for The Virginian Pilot in Norfolk, Va., before heading to New York, where I was both a staff writer and editor for several magazines before returning to my preferred life as a freelancer. I?ve been lucky: This work has made it possible for me to live and work all over the world, including London, Helsinki, Moscow, New York and Los Angeles.

You have handled a variety of writing projects, from magazine articles and scriptwriting for film and video to marketing writing and writing a book. Do you have a preference ? one type of writing or writing project you like better than the others?

For me, whatever the form, it?s always a question of whether there?s a good story and a way for me to create something that?s authentic and can connect with an audience. My work as a journalist has provided me a foundation for everything else?how to ask questions and dig for answers, how to gauge intuitively whether a subject is timely and will resonate, how to capture a scene, how to find the right combination of fact and poetry? how to turn a grueling deadline into an opportunity.?

I love writing films?writing dialogue, creating scenes, coming up with characters, building a narrative and drama. That?s probably the purest and most demanding use of imagination. But I always felt that script-writing is only the blueprint; I sought to be involved after the script gets written to play a key role in bringing the material to life. It?s enormously exciting to start with an idea and words on paper and see it lead to a whole team of people working on set to make it happen. So I also worked as a producer or director, which greatly adds to the challenge of getting your work sold and made. I devoted about a decade to this?features, TV movies, short films?and I had some success both in the US and Europe.? But I longed to get back to the written word where I could have greater control in the end project?and where the timeline between writing, selling and publication would be comparatively brief and not so exasperating.

Are there significant differences in doing scripts or marketing writing versus more journalistic types of writing? How did you gain the skillset needed to do each type of writing or did it just come naturally to you?
You probably have to be a little crazy to believe you can do all of these things. I only had the formal training as a journalist (I studied in the graduate school of Northwestern University?s Medill School of Journalism). But again, I think the key is having a strong story sense, trusting in your ability to ask the right questions when you don?t understand, studying the form as intensively as you can before jumping into it, figuring out what is that special thing that you can bring to it, and then convincing both yourself and your prospective buyers that you really can do it.

You also served as a managing executive editor for The Ritz-Carlton Magazine. What was it like to be on the other side of the desk, so to speak? What did the experience teach you that you were able to take back to your writing career?
I first worked as an editor in the ?90s when I was a Senior Editor at a television magazine in New York. I wasn?t ready then, because I always kept thinking when I got writers? copy that I should have done it myself. By the time I was editing The Ritz-Carlton, I understood that I couldn?t do everything myself and really needed good writers who could help generate ideas, surprise me with their stories and put out a great magazine.?
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What I learned was that I only wanted to work with writers who can produce good story pitches, always meet their deadlines, deliver clean and engaging copy and understand that word counts matter. As a writer, I often imagined that I could turn in a story far longer than an editor wanted, but if it was great, they?d be happy. Truth is, a story that diverges widely from the agreed upon length creates more work for the editor and adds to their problems.?

After returning to writing full-time four years ago, I was better able to understand that editors are under enormous time pressure and depend on writers who can make their life easier. I think that?s been helpful in landing assignments: editors recognize that I appreciate their challenges in doing their jobs well.

In keeping with the theme for the month ? "Open to Opportunity"? can you share a story where you had an opportunity to do a project that was new to you, but, because you said yes, it turned out to be a rewarding experience?
Let me mention two. One was the chance to do a travel feature from London for The Ritz-Carlton. While I had international experience and lived in London before, I hadn?t really written travel stories before. This was a chance to get my feet wet writing about travel?and writing mostly in first-person, which I hadn?t done much before. Suffice to say, it went well, laying the groundwork for me to do many more first person stories for a bunch of different travel magazines.

The other was a request to write some science stories for a science organization. To put it simply, I barely passed chemistry and wondered whether I could pull this off.? But what I learned was that the more you?ve developed the skill to explain things for a general audience, the more you can write about almost anything, even science. I also learned that I really like scientists, who I find similar to artists or even chefs; the best of them are creative thinkers who ask questions and possess great imagination. Since then, I?ve taken other opportunities to do science-related stories.

Do you actively pursue new types of projects ? in other words, do you make yourself open to opportunities ? or just wait for them to show up?

As mentioned, I?m always looking for story ideas that I can pitch to editors. There are about a dozen or so magazines and editors that I have written for that I know will seriously consider my pitches. Sometimes I?ll pitch editors I don?t know. Sometimes editors I know will ask me if I?m interested in doing a particularly story or have an idea about how to handle a particular subject.?

Beyond that, I?ve found that my website does lead to unexpected opportunities now and then. Soon I?ll be editing a nature photography book, for example, created by a Canadian writer-photographer who found me online. I get requests fairly often from screenwriters and producers who are interested in getting me involved in their film projects. I?ve also sharpened my website description of how I can help interesting companies or nonprofits, in hopes of attracting a few new corporate clients. I also get occasional requests to write or ghost-write a book, but I?m actively focused on developing my own new one now. That said, probably like most writers, I frequently question whether I?m doing enough to keep the pipeline filled.

Do you think writers tend to stay within their own comfort level too often? What?s the danger ? and is there a danger ? in being identified as, for example, a ?marketing writer,? a ?health writer,? a ?magazine writer? or ?corporate writer? as opposed to being more of a generalist? How do you define yourself ? or does it change depending on who you are approaching?
I think it?s a real benefit if you have a clear and singular niche. Early in my career, I was often identified as a business writer, which created a lot of opportunities. But I had a strong desire to expand well beyond that. Now I may suffer from having an overly diverse portfolio that may confuse or discourage some potential employers.?

But while I may focus on one aspect of my background for travel editors, another for film producers, another for editors who want me to write op-eds and still another for corporate clients, I hope that all of them grasp that I know how to shape a compelling story, whatever the subject.

In 2011, you co-authored a book ? Adrift: Charting Our Course Back to a Great Nation.?Was it challenging or difficult for you to work with another writer, given that so much of your writing work has been a ?one-man show??
I was very lucky. My co-author, who was a marvelous source of ideas but not a writer, was very open and respectful of my work. He really let me draft the chapters freely, then reviewed and discussed any needed revisions.??

I know of too many cases where writers agree to work on a co-authored book and end up struggling to reach agreement over the direction and the prose itself. In my case, my co-author was even happy to have me handle the lion?s share of the radio and TV interviews once we began promoting it. That?s unusual.

What are you doing now? What projects are you currently engaged in?

At the moment, I have a handful of magazine assignments, including pieces from Dublin and St. Petersburg, Russia. Soon I?ll be editing and rewriting a photography book. I?m producing a monthly education-related newsletter, and I write periodic Sunday Viewpoints pieces for the Arizona Republic, where I?m based. I?m involved in one film project set in 1970s Ireland. Perhaps most important, I?m trying to finalize a proposal for a new book, which my agent would like me to get done sooner rather than later. I couldn?t agree more: I?m really looking forward to focusing all of my energy on a new book as soon as I can.

When and where do you do most of your writing?
I have an office with a window to the front porch. I try to start work as early in the morning as I can, when my mind is still fresh, uncorrupted by the demands of the day. This increases my ability to get into a good zone and flow.

Any last words of advice for writers to mark ?Open to Opportunity week??

Life is short.? Don?t dream small. Work hard and practice your craft every day. Be sure to take risks to stay fresh. You never know what doors you can open.?

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My thanks to Steven Beschloss for sharing his approach to a writing career at The Writer's Place!

Source: http://nancychristie.blogspot.com/2012/08/interview-with-steven-beschloss.html

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