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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Original Post - Aug 22, 2014 - 07:15pm PT
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I started climbing in the early 90's. I was and still am obsessed. I saved every climbing magazine I bought and could not get enough. There were great articles, pertinent photos, and good paper. They averaged over 160 pages per issue and showed a variety of climbing. I know the industry has changed and the decline has happened in other types of magazines as well. I know some of the people that work in the industry and think they do great work, but the overall package has diminished greatly in my opinion. So many more ads, so much more lame content like how to pull on a hold or buy a pack. The overall writing seems to have taken the biggest hit. Magazines these days seem to be written by the interns that do not have the overall experience of some of the authors in the past. What do you think?
Edit:I really think Alpinist is great, but can no longer afford to pay $13/issue.
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Darwin
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Aug 22, 2014 - 07:17pm PT
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yeah, back when Mountain published British writers, Ascent existed, and we couldn't get almost all the photos we wanted on the internet.
Alpinist still seems great sometimes for the writing.
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Tricouni
Mountain climber
Vancouver
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Aug 22, 2014 - 07:23pm PT
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I think Alpinist is superb. Yes, there are a few weak pieces, but every magazine has some. The writing often reminds me of the old-style Ascent mags. I know $13 is steep but, knowing something about the publishing industry, that is what they must charge to cover their costs. Printing and good paper are not cheap. For me, it is worth it.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Aug 22, 2014 - 07:30pm PT
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They have declined for the same reasons other print media have declined.
People can get news and almost the same material if not more for free (and sooner) on
the internet, so people stopped their subscriptions.
So magazines/newspapers can't afford to pay their writers much,
and they may increase the use of ads in the death spiral.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 07:34pm PT
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comparison of 12 issues from the early 90's and 12 from the last few years. The quality of paper is amazingly different.
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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Aug 22, 2014 - 07:38pm PT
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Edit:I really think Alpinist is great, but can no longer afford to pay $13/issue.
If Alpinist cut its price to match the magazines you dislike, what do you think it would look/read like?
Climbing has been commoditized just like everything else. How do you think the people who were totally committed to the surfing lifestyle way back when (or the mountain biking, or skateboarding, or skiing, or whatever lifestyle) feel about the magazines covering their passion now?
If you love climbing, go climbing.
If you need non-commercial magazines about your favorite activity, give up climbing and go cave-diving. Or, read the TRs here on Supertoprope.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 07:41pm PT
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Gear issues suck. Photo issues suck(even though I love photos and many of the photographers) as you can be done with the issues in an hour or so. News flashes suck. How to articles suck. Ads suck. I want to read about suffering in the Ruth Gorge. I want to hear about the bolting wars and the pioneers. I want to hear about great new places with more than a couple of paragraphs and a bunch of photos on crappy paper. Epics issues are awesome.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 07:44pm PT
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Ghost I know why it happened just missing the old days. With the number of ads and poor quality of paper and printing in today's rags they should give them away which occasionally they do on e versions. They might make more money if they did give them away.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 07:51pm PT
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At least with the new ones you can get dual use recycling after dropping the kids off at the pool. The paper is so thin the wrinkles won't chafe you too bad.
Seen gripped online a couple of times it looks cool. So does the rest of Canada. Love Terry Fox.
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:03pm PT
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I just donated about 10 years of Climbing (1990-2000) to my local library. Given how many threads you see here about others trying to sell or pass them off, I hoped that the local burgeoning climbers in this community would get some benefit from them.
The writing & content in those years was so much more superior that today's rags (Alpinist excepted).
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 08:09pm PT
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Nice apogee I have talked to the university library where I work and they were not too interested. My kid loves them too much anyway.
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WBraun
climber
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:14pm PT
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Remember when climbing magazines were great.
What's in in them anyways?
I never read em nor have I ever bought one .....
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:24pm PT
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ms55401
Trad climber
minneapolis, mn
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:25pm PT
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my climbing gym has old copies of Climbing. It's startling how good the content was as late as the early 1990s
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limpingcrab
Trad climber
the middle of CA
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:32pm PT
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You need an attention span for real magazines, nobody has time for that anymore!
I can't even read ST posts that go more than 4 or 5 lines.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Aug 22, 2014 - 08:45pm PT
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I remember BITD, coming home to find Climbing in the mailbox. Everything stopped for 2 hours and I devoured the contents.
I just finished a one years subscription to Climbing, after a 13 year hiatus. It was nice to get it in the mail, but tedious to read. Looks like Surfer Magazine, loaded with superfluous fashion ads. An occasional good training article. Only 20 bucks to renew, and you get Ski Magazine for free. I could only imagine what Ski looks like now. I will pass on both
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 22, 2014 - 09:03pm PT
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This one was so great I had it framed on my shop wall in Berkeley, right behind the counter next to the business license.For example:
Is this historic first issue's cover a butt shot?
It's at Tremadoc in Wales.
Butt who is The Dude Up There?
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Aug 22, 2014 - 10:07pm PT
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I ran into former editor of both Rock and Ice and Climbing, Dougald McDonald, while climbing in Boulder Canyon a month ago. He said one big reason why magazines are in decline is that advertisers are putting a lot of their money into videos as a way of spreading their message and building their brand.
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Aug 22, 2014 - 10:14pm PT
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Along the lines about what Clint said about the magazines not being able to pay for good writers, I remember reading in Steve House's book about how after he did the first alpine ascent of the Rupal Face of Nanga Parbat he got numerous requests from climbing magazines for an article on the climb, most of which asked him to provide the article for free!
It should be noted that the 2006 ascent was so noteworthy that it won the Piolet d'Or that year. That is a huge statement on the state of climbing magazines that they would ask for a free article on such a groundbreaking climb.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 22, 2014 - 10:22pm PT
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I think there are good articles but there are one or two instead of 10. There just seems to be so much how to do yoga, gear reviews, or stuff besides actual writing about climbing.
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Michael Hjorth
Trad climber
Copenhagen, Denmark
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Aug 23, 2014 - 08:48am PT
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mfm: Damn, I had hoped to be able to answer your question...! But it doesn't say in the caption of Issue #1. Only that the photographer was John Hartley (who ever that was...).
I have almost a full Mountain Mag serie from 1 to 145, unfortunately except #2,3,5,8 & 18. A never dwindling source of reading material.
Anyone out there who can help me out with those six issues...?
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clinker
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, California
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Aug 23, 2014 - 09:17am PT
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"During the descent they chopped a good portion of the Compressor route, including the entire headwall and one of the pitches below. The Compressor route is no more."
Platform for old and new idiots, but there were always gems every few issues that made the digging worth it.
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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Aug 23, 2014 - 09:58am PT
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Since the demise of Vulgarian Digest, things have never been the same!
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Aug 23, 2014 - 10:18am PT
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Butt who is The Dude Up There?
Can I guess...Trevor Jones?
I have a pile of extras of Climbing and Rock and Ice if anyone's trying to fill their collection in. Summit too.
I need...
Climbing 7, 9, 11, 91, 107, 284, 311, 313-321 and 323-326.
Rock and Ice 16, 37, 202, 210, 215 and 217.
Cheers!
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 23, 2014 - 11:08am PT
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Stuck in a backwater like I am I would eat up everything on climbing I could find. I think we should start a new one that goes something like this old retired guy(and gals)adventure stories retold. Stories by guido, Tom Cochran. Donini and such would be eaten up by a lot of people.
Dingus McGee once told me about giving a mountain goat an abortion. He found goat that was giving birth to a still born kid, but the fetus had not exited and the goat was obviously debilitated because of it. He and some friends wrestled it down and pulled it out not without some major effort. It apparently saved the goats life. Tom's story of flying into the winds in winter and then getting rescued by the first snowmobile in the state of Wyoming is such a classic story. Donini can spill the dirt on most of the old climbers the day and seems willing seems very willing to do so in person. He could have a monthly column.
Just a few thoughts and I honestly believe even today's hot young climbers are going to enjoy reading that more than who put up the 10,000ed 5.14. There is a place for technique, gear reviews, ads, and other stuff. I just wish it was a smaller place.
On second thought I think it should all be politics and religion.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Aug 23, 2014 - 11:52am PT
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Ahhh, people have always bitched about the mags.
Right now, Rock & Ice is rolling.
Go to the website and sign up for their weekly TNB article. They are written by various people, and often funny as hell.
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Aug 23, 2014 - 11:54am PT
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Hey Brian - for what it's worth, Issue 202 of Rock And Ice appears to be the issue of ASCENT for 2012. Just mentioning as it doesn't have a number on the spine (or inside as far as I can see), but the ensuing issues of ASCENT are definitely counted as issue number (number on spine).
Edit: I'm missing R&I 2 through 11, and 37 if you have dupes of any of those or anyone else has them.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 23, 2014 - 03:44pm PT
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"Of course my big beef is there isn't enough funny stuff in the mags.
Everyone is so damn dour and dire and melodramatic."--PoodlePusher
Edit--
The Sheridan appeared in the Jim Perrin review below.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 23, 2014 - 04:00pm PT
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Mountain ran an intermittent series of reports from Camp 4 or Valley-based ‘correspondents’ who came and went, but who actually knew the scene or enough about the haps to make a report that might sound credible and informed. This reportage, along with similar reports from around the climbing meccas later mutated into their INFO section.
Werner, you didn’t miss much by not reading magazines. You were f*#kin’ THERE!
You should have had your turn as a correspondent for Mountain, dude.
I can imagine your reports, mostly one-liners--
“Two Frenchies came and did the Salathe. Big deal.”
“Nobody died this month. No big deal.”
"Dale climbed all day today. All day yesterday. All day the day before. I still got him beat."
“Stupid North American Wall was done in record time by a six-idiot team of insane clowns. Whoop whoop!”
In my day, the funniest man writing in Mountain was Ian McNaught-Davies.
Michael Hjorth, thanks. And there is no help here on this sparklingly WITTY page, either.
Well, chalk it up to Wilson's ineptitude. What a twit, not mentioning Dude' actual NAME! It could be Welsh Jebus! Or Dingus Milkington of Tremadoc! Famous in their day. Now, who knows what van they might be living in down by the Test?
Also, Michael, here is this, too, from the Classifieds of Climbing.
Good luck, bud.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Aug 23, 2014 - 04:55pm PT
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Hey Brian - for what it's worth, Issue 202 of Rock And Ice appears to be the issue of ASCENT for 2012. Just mentioning as it doesn't have a number on the spine (or inside as far as I can see), but the ensuing issues of ASCENT are definitely counted as issue number (number on spine).
Edit: I'm missing R&I 2 through 11, and 37 if you have dupes of any of those or anyone else has them.
Ahh...yeah...forgot, as, I filed those Ascents with that earlier run. Accounts for 202 and 210 issues of R&I. Thanks!
Looked through my mag's for ya...most of my older doubles are climbing starting around issue 37 or so. R&I doubles start later than the ones you're looking for.
Its a curse...ha ha...
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Michael Hjorth
Trad climber
Copenhagen, Denmark
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Aug 23, 2014 - 04:58pm PT
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Those Mountain issues of Embicks? Somewhat too late, sad to say...!
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 23, 2014 - 06:33pm PT
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Oh, sh!t. That never really occurred to me. Believe me, I'm sorry if it offended anyone. I only knew Dr. Andy thru Roy Naasz.
Three climbing Andys I have known,
Two climbing Andys now have flown,
And e-nuff said on that sad subject.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Aug 23, 2014 - 07:43pm PT
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Wow mouse, mountain #1!
Mike, if you started climbing in '91, I think you don't, remember when climbing mags were awesome.... Mountain was the main one, but summit, off belay, North American climber. As well as glmbing and the late starter r&i had real content back.
Clearly, the internet changed the whole scene. But the need for increased sales / ad revenue did it too, seemingly a bit earlier.
There was an inflection point in the early nineties when the mags switched from a forum for participants to a sports illustrated style, spectator sport style model.
Alpinist is the last harkening back to the good stuff.
The Climbing Art was a small circulation literary climbing mag. We will probably never see that format again! Sigh..
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Aug 23, 2014 - 08:19pm PT
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I started climbing in 1974.
I collected full sets of Climbing, Rock & Ice and Mountain magazines, from #1 up to the most recent issues.
Except, of course, Mountain magazine which went out of print, but I had the entire set.
I am selling off my entire collection of books and magazines.
All of the magazines have already been sold.
I had plans to spend my retirement sitting around a reading every single page of all of those magazines, but I decided to lighten my load and get rid of everything. I am too old to climb, but recently I got into fighting, so now fight every week instead and it keeps me young. Don't need no climbing books or magazines anymore.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Aug 23, 2014 - 11:51pm PT
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You had to like "Summit," a magazine so amateurish it reeked of virtue. It witnessed the evolution of climbing from the mysterious and often sublime challenge of exploration to the revelatory celebration of secure and certain athletic achievement. Articles by Robbins and Rowell and others captured a zeitgeist that is, unfortunately, gone forever.
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FRUMY
Trad climber
Bishop,CA
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Aug 24, 2014 - 01:13am PT
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What ever happened to hot belayer magazine?
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jstan
climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 01:29am PT
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WBraun
climber
Aug 22, 2014 - 08:14pm PT
Remember when climbing magazines were great.
What's in in them anyways?
I never read em nor have I ever bought one .....
apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
Aug 22, 2014 - 08:24pm PT
This crowd is something else.
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FRUMY
Trad climber
Bishop,CA
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Aug 24, 2014 - 01:33am PT
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Now that's what I'm talking about ^^^^^^ HO HOT BELAYER.
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jstan
climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 01:47am PT
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Back when the magazines were good any time you saw a woman with rope burns around her waist, you knew it was safe to move in. Then the damn magazines went to hell......
Now we have to go to Stanford to get a Project Management Professional Certificate. How bad do you suppose this is going to get?
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nopantsben
climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 04:04am PT
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The New Yorker costs 10€ is Austria.
Alpinist costs 18€ in Austria.
(by this I mean that here, Alpinist is not that expensive in terms of how many pages it has and the quality of the paper etc. the quality of the writing is the crux.)
If I want to read one article that is well written, I can buy both. But in the long run, I find that Alpinist has the problem that all the articles (reports, mountain profiles, etc.) written by climbers (contributing editors, generally) are Ives-ified to the point where they all sound the same. Don't get me wrong, Katie Ives is the best writer that specialises in alpinism that I have read, by quite the margin. Her writing is lucid, intelligent, well researched and honest. I find that the problem is that the author's own voice does not shine through strongly enough in a lot of Alpinist's pieces.
I love reading her own writing, but it is a tremendous bummer that virtually everything someone authors goes through her (very manipulative, very erudite) hands.
The New Yorker is my favourite magazine, and I couldn't imagine spending that money on a climbing porn mag like R&I or Climbing or Klettern. If anything it'd be Alpinist, if the content were more interesting again. I loved most of the first 20 issues, and a lot of the ones till 30, but recently, not so much. Haven't looked at the last two though....
(As a sidenote, I have personal experience with Alpinist's editing and am not just guessing)
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chill
climber
between the flat part and the blue wobbly thing
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Aug 24, 2014 - 08:08am PT
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That issue of Mountain 1 cost "three shillings and ninepence". Sounds like something out of Mary Poppins. Do Brits even use shillings anymore?
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Aug 24, 2014 - 08:10am PT
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I'm guessing most climbers' writing is nearly unreadable...and benefits greatly from an "erudite" editor. Climbers mostly just don't write that good (ha ha).
Its an interesting slant, though. My guess is that a good editor can make a magazine much, much better.
Interesting to ponder. The current slice of editing staff at both of the major climbing rags, Climbing and Rock and Ice, is loaded with familiar names many of which are fairly well published and whose own writing has been well received. I still find worth in both rags. But, the magazine I read immediately upon receipt, cover to cover, is Alpinist.
Hmmm. Worth some reflection to think about...
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nopantsben
climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 09:43am PT
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I don't think I said what I wanted to say very clearly, so I'll try again I guess.
The opposite of what you say is the case, Tami : I am not serving up a bowl full of sour grapes. Quite on the contrary. I merely tried to explain why I think that even Alpinist could be better than it is. And that is not because I think the writing is not good. (!!) In a way, the writing is too good.
It is also not because Ives is not a good editor, for clarity's sake.
Ives is a good editor. And if you factor in the texts she starts out with, you can't help but be at awe at what she manages.
Still, again: I feel like her style is too recognisable in pieces that she doesn't author. I think that is because like every great writer's work, her writing has a sort of personal identity. You can tell what is by her and what is not within a few paragraphs. It's not an in-your-face sort of idiosyncratic way of writing, but rather a hard-to-pin-down personal signature that her texts have.
Yes she won't please all the people all the time but if you are a writer nopantsben with any commitment at all to your craft, you'll go back to Ives' notes & edits to you & realize she was helping you to be a stronger writer.
Well, yes, that is true. The problem is: A lot of advice she gives that would ultimately lead to the climbers finding their voice falls on deaf ears, and she ends up suggesting stuff that is put into the text. Mostly because the climbers are not genuinely interested in writing well.
This is not her fault.
While she makes the text better, she is too good a writer to make me feel that it was really a 25-year-old foreign climber that wrote a certain piece, as an example.
Anyway, my point is this one: If there were more different editors working with the climbers (even if they were slightly less good than Ives) , the result would be more interesting to me.
If everything works out perfectly a piece like the K6 one of Slawinski is created. I was blown away. That was a really touching, well-thought-out and beautifully written piece of work.
(I feel like I am repeating myself. Maybe I misunderstand what you're saying Tami.)
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 24, 2014 - 09:51am PT
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no one has mentioned Ascent, which had generated a lot of "mountain literature" that has endured.
talk about editorial intervention... there are the legendary rewrites by Roper and Steck fueled by red wine consumption... I don't think they were "coaches," I doubt that the authors had much feedback, and there wasn't an option for getting an article published that sidestepped their editorial brush, but the collaboration of author and editor produced some very good literature.
and I find the "surprise" that an editor would ask an author to contribute for the minimum compensation (for free) in a business enterprise which cannot possibly be even self sustaining, let alone profitable, somewhat disingenuous, or if not that, horribly self-centered...
climbers, who after all are the main audience for the magazines, are a notoriously resource poor lot... at least as we remember our own youth.
it also isn't so surprising that the climbing magazines that actually make it today are vehicles for advertisers of climbing stuff, and sell mostly to climbers who have the resources to both buy the magazine and buy the stuff advertised in the rag... and with the number of photogs available, it is also no surprise that those ads are difficult to distinguish from the images appearing in the articles... the photogs don't get that much more compensation for doing either
climbing has changed tremendously in the era of the climbing magazine, and the risks that climbers are willing to take along with the consequences of those risks isn't really a part of the discussion anymore. better to put in articles telling you how to train so you can crush that 80' sport clip up, what helmet to wear, and how to recover from the strain of training than have heart felt memorials to close colleagues and friends who were swept off of mountains while they were part of a reinvention of big mountain climbs bringing self-sufficient, super-alpinist methods to 8000m peaks. a whole generation of the British climbing community was lost to this idea.
one wonders how an idea can kill... and one can see that this wouldn't be a part of the current climbing "aesthetic"
an aside on editing...
in everything I have ever written for public consumption I have always benefited from a good editor. if nothing else, someone who can read, can construct the intent of the article, see what is necessary and what is not to get the essential point across (because they could see what the essential point was!) and to communicate those criticisms in a constructive manner, could be seen as an essential help if one aspires to actually communicate in writing.
Writers eventually come across a sentiment usually attributed to Dorothy Parker, perhaps because it helps them do something very hard, "killing your darlings," a murder of those parts of your writing that you hold dear, in some conceit that they would be seen equally dear to the reader...
an editor is a necessary accomplice in conducting such murder... failure often leaves the article's author's voice intact, but to no good effect but to that author's sentimental feelings for that bit of writing. and sentimental feelings don't usually make good literature.
good literature isn't accidental, writing isn't a gift... it's all hard work to produce something of value, and though romanticised beyond recognition, the product of writing is generally fleeting, no matter how good it is... like almost all art, it's direct value is ephemeral, the ideas may have a lasting value, often detached from the item itself... becoming a part of the consciousness of all times.
Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story
of that man skilled in all ways of contending,
the wanderer, harried for years on end...
maybe he got fed a good meal in the telling...
and his encore performance (and those meals) depending on editing out the boring stuff and keeping the interesting stuff.
Here's to all the editors out there! I sing thy praise.
and offer you thanks for all that you allowed me to accomplish.
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Aug 24, 2014 - 09:59am PT
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Interesting contrast in views between Tami & nopantsben.
Tami's...from the standpoint of being a contributor to any of these magazines, and having directly observed & experienced the editing process on her work (and others)....
...and ben's...from the standpoint of reader (I'm assuming), who has an objective experience of being a reader with no 'horse in the race'.
Both very valid views, and I appreciate the respectful way they are described.
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jstan
climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 10:07am PT
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http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Climbing-the-Dent-du-G-ant-unabridged-version-to-one-of-Chams-most-scenic-peaks/t12495n.html
In a prior existence I was on the east ridge of something in the Tetons hopping between the biggest rocks I could find in hopes all would stay put. Alpinism was clearly something enjoyed by those who survived noobdom and had successfully learned about mountains and the weather. Sort of a Russian roulette but one in which learning is possible. But, and a big but, you can get it wrong only once.
When Messner was asked if it all was worth losing his brother over, he did not really have an answer. I guess because we don't get to live another life as a control group. For the rest of us we can only wish that Charlie Porter had consumed fewer sticky buns, Charlie Fowler and Christine had stayed off those steep snow slopes, and JB had just said to himself, "You know. I really am getting older."
Writing in which this comes across is first rate stuff.
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Tricouni
Mountain climber
Vancouver
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Aug 24, 2014 - 10:35am PT
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Interesting posts here, esp. between Tami & nopantsben. I find myself more in sympathy with Tami, but there is a whiff of truth for me in what nopants says. There is a bit of homogeneity to the writing style of many of the pieces in Alpinist, but that's ok with me. Most climbers (and most people, for that matter) can't write: look at the quality of the average ST post to see what I mean.
The problem with climbing writing is that there are only so many ways to describe a certain climbs. Most climbing writing is boring because it's the same old stuff. The AAJ is the journal of record of our passion, sure, but most of the writing is not very good. I don't go back and reread articles there the way I can with old issues of Ascentand Alpinist. As Ed said, much of what appeared in Ascent has endured. It's too early for me to make a similar call for Alpinist because I haven't been reading it that long. But certainly the article on the Pickets in the latest issue seems to meet my tests: interweaving threads of first nations, exploratory mountaineering, environmental issues, guidebooks or not, hard modern routes told in prose that gives the essence of that range.
I agree that many people want how-to articles. The problem is that, because magazine readership turns over every few years, you have to keep repeating the how-to material, which soon becomes repetitive for the longer-term reader. Every magazine faces this issue: attract new readers or try and keep the current readers. For most, it is a balancing act.
I am not interested in the results of the latest climbing competition Keep that stuff for the web version of the mag. I want material that might be of lasting value, that gives me pleasure to read and contemplate. And I'll pay good money for that.
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Katie_I
Mountain climber
Wyoming
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Aug 24, 2014 - 10:40am PT
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Thanks for all the interesting feedback! I want to speak up, briefly, for the people who write for Alpinist, because I feel (with all respect) that some comments might give a misleading sense of the process and fail to credit the writers’ own often very intense labor. The majority of our writers work incredibly hard—behind every story that is published there are often weeks or months (or in a few cases years) of their revisions, research and fact-checking (carried out by the writers with the assistance of our fact-checkers).
While many big magazine editors will simply rewrite an author’s work to suit the style of a particular publication (the most efficient method), I spend a lot of time working with writers on explaining different elements of craft, trying to figure out what parts of their stories are genuinely their voice and what parts might be detracting from their voice—and then I ask for multiple rewrites until we end up with something that is as true to their individual vision as possible and that also meets the standards of the majority of our readers (who subscribe to the magazine specifically because of the writing).
One of the things that inspires me is working with beginning writers and helping them get to a point where they can produce something that has literary value. Someone looking from the outside won’t know, necessarily, that many of those writers have gone through many drafts, read books and articles that I’ve suggested, waded through pages of feedback from me and then put a lot of effort into their own education and improvement. (Those who have asked for more direct writing aid from me are in the minority—only representing a few stories in the past ten years that I’ve been here.)
That commitment to helping writers is the number one reason I work 100-hour weeks instead of 40-hour ones. And we do strive to publish a diversity of voices—everything from the dark humor of someone like Andy Kirkpatrick, to the philosophical minimalism of someone like Katsutaka Yokoyama, to the spare matter-of-factness of Alex Honnold (in the last issue) to the academic insight of Maurice Isserman to the ornate prose of Peter Haan or the lyricism of Charlotte Austin.
And as to the number of editors at Alpinist: Because we publish minimal ads, print on high-quality paper, and chose stories that aren’t mainstream (no sport climbing, gym or comp climbing, no gear reviews in the print mag, no how-tos or top-ten lists, hence no mass audience), we have to function on a very small budget. Since Alpinist 43, we’ve been able to hire the talented Matt Samet to help on a part-time, freelance basis with some of the workload.
We're fortunate that the owners of the magazine are invested in Alpinist because they care about mountain literature, and they put quality ahead of profit. It's a labor of love for everyone--but we'll never have the vast resources of a magazine like The New Yorker. We get by as we can, working long hours and depending on community support. No issue will be perfect--we all push ourselves to the limits of our capacity and ability four times a year, but we also try to learn from our mistakes.
(I can’t follow this thread too much because I’m in the midst of another 100-hour week.)
Katie Ives
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Mad69Dog
Ice climber
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Aug 24, 2014 - 10:56am PT
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"yeah, back when Mountain published British writers"
Not all the Brit writers dealt properly with their topic. They seemed to hate Messner as he was pushing at the front.
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Katie_I
Mountain climber
Wyoming
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Aug 24, 2014 - 10:59am PT
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Maybe that was a bad choice of phrase for me. But I do want to support high-quality climbing writing--that's one of the purposes of the magazine.
For people who prefer unedited rough drafts, there's always the Internet and blogs. Print magazines exist to curate work in a way that's perhaps more polished and ideally potentially timeless--since a magazine will exist on a bookshelf or in a library for a long time, you want to create something that might have the possibility of becoming a classic.
I believe in helping writers achieve their potential--writing is a craft that takes dedication, work and care, just as climbing does.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, CA
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Aug 24, 2014 - 11:02am PT
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Well said, Paul Roehl.
Summit Magazine, published by two gals bitd, Big Bear Lake, CA as I remember. More termitic than mainstream. A slim little periodical more from the Thirties-Forties in aesthetic and view, than what we soon were having. Royal was kind of one of their editors even, I guess a contributing editor, and wanted to help them out.
But soon it was clear that even by going color, they would be buried by the new wave of publications. First climbing writing I did was for a little piece in their magazine with Royal as my editor. (g).
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 24, 2014 - 11:10am PT
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"I'm guessing most climbers' writing is nearly unreadable."
I'm guessing your tongue is buried in your cheek, you cheeky monkey.
Best laff I had today, Brian!
"They did some 5.10. They rapped. And everyone lived happily ever after."
jstan, I'm too old to read that article, that monumental classic (I'm sure) based on the suggestion of a guy who only helped refine the 5.12 rating on the East Coast. It would take me too long, depriving me of posting.
THAT SAID, I like to read mainly book-length works on climbing.
From what I see the world is so full of sound bights that 'tention spans are shortened by default among the young, in particular.
One either loves to entertain or to inform when one takes up the pen.
You get what you pay for.
You only get ahead by working hard to improve constantly.
One of the problems I have in writing, and which has kept me from offering my services as an editor (I've nothing, really nothing, important to say that would be commercially appealing) is that I find it hard to PLAN what I want to write myself. An editor's job, is in large part re-assembly of parts in a box, the so-called "final draft," full of "little darlings" and making it forceful, easily-read (all of the commas need to be there, poor punctuation is a big distraction to me) and entertaining. Whether it's ideas or views be assumed into the public's collective awareness is not of concern, or should be low priority.
I can't outline because I don't like to do the work, the thinking. It takes intent, cunning, sometimes outright deceit on the writer's part to get his point across and to maybe even sway an opinion. I look at what Ed wrote upthread and what Ed said made me read the whole thing because I'll bet he PLANNED his points.
"Good literature isn't accidental."
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Aug 24, 2014 - 11:17am PT
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I blame Rock & Ice.
R&I made *the community* the focus, and put top level climbing achievement somewhere second. Then Climbing felt the need to do likewise. Like *Reality* TV in a magazine.
That's what I actually like most about climbing, having fun with my pals. I enjoy the drive out there, the approach, knocking back a not-so-cold one on the summit while enjoying the view and the company, and even sorting the gear when we're done. But it makes for lousy reading.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 24, 2014 - 11:22am PT
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For people who prefer unedited rough drafts, there's always the Internet and blogs.
when I started the Sacherer thread I was asking a question that interested me... and eventually I became an editor for that thread.
Being the editor meant following up on lots of leads, and eventually discussing the matter with Jan when she discovered the thread and was mulling entering in on it, not being familiar with the literary form of STForum (and there is a distinct voice here).
Following up on a few recollections that Jan shared with me, and then getting some more leads from one of the people she recalled, I found that someone I had known was active at CERN and in climbing was the key...
Now having the essential story of Sacherer I wondered what to do with it... and I'm still wondering. Part of the editing was responding to many contributors that there was a lot of silly writing contributed to the thread, couldn't I please do something about it?
But that's not the way the blog sphere works, and especially here on STForum where, within a huge range, most things are possible.
I'd love to write up that thread as some more important piece, but I'm trapped in what had unfolded as the process of that thread, the discoveries, the surprising twists and turns, the amazing conclusions, which occurred more than once.
To me the story of how the thread unfolded was as amazing as the story that was told there.
I wouldn't be surprised if someone was writing it up, and I'd welcome it, but I felt that I had a shot at it once... if there were a good editor to collaborate with, who was interested and could serve has a guide, then the story could be told as a piece of our literature, a piece that would properly recognize Sacherer...
...without that editorial collaboration, in my mind, the whole story is a muddle of my own emotional reaction with the revelations. Those reactions aren't necessarily very interesting to the rest of you (as you have no doubt turned off by this point).
what I'd say is that editorial input and vision are very important to creating that literature...
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 24, 2014 - 11:59am PT
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I can’t follow this thread too much because I’m in the midst of another 100-hour week.
I was wondering mightily how & why you were reading THIS crap and claiming to be working a hundred-hour week, dear KI, you word assassin, you plunderer of paragraphs!!!!!
Edit: LOL, KI.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 24, 2014 - 12:02pm PT
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Ed recognizes our style and yet he's one of us.
What a little darling. :0)
[Click to View YouTube Video]We generally like some tunes to go with our commentary.
Where's Marlow?
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Aug 24, 2014 - 12:11pm PT
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Hmm. Have climbing magazines really gotten worse, or are we becoming a worse audience?
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Mark Rodell
Trad climber
Bangkok
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Aug 25, 2014 - 06:55am PT
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When I was a teen and new to climbing any and all magazines that touched on our passion were great. Now it takes more to get and hold my attention. From my experience Alpinist pushes me both as a reader and writer....the rewards rich.
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Baggins
Boulder climber
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Aug 25, 2014 - 09:39am PT
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Any lifestyle magazine is bound to end up recycling things - I am always amazed how many fishing magazines there are out there for instance. Theyre aiming their material more towards those new to the sport, who are more likely to be buying the mags.
I really like R&I right now. The photography is stellar, and they have Niall Grimes (from Northern Ireland) writing a column who is hilarious.
But yeah we're facing an unknown future for the employment of writers photographers etc ie content creation. So many forms of media outlets exist and ppl now demand everything free on the internet. The internet certainly seems to be spawning a type of socialism, albeit in the midst of the most fierce capitalistic market we have ever lived in.
I agree that books still will continue to be popular.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Aug 25, 2014 - 02:45pm PT
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good thread, mike m!
Agree that the mags have become less and less interesting. Used to go buy them all, read them right through. Loved the articles with topos and descriptions (and alluring photos) for exotic routes in obscure corners of Montana or Arizona or wherever. Sometimes they'd inspire for a new road trip.
What changed?
The increasing commercialization of climbing, the advent of gyms that try to attract families, guide services that are professional, reliable, safe, standardized.
and mostly the sponsoring of climbers. I've nothing against sponsored climbers in person but when climbing is their job, reading of their work-day routines/projects becomes predictable and dull.
Used to be that the leading climbers were driven, eccentric, wacky characters. Their exploits were exciting, their motivation fascinating to ponder, their writings (and photos) fun, enigmatic and inspiring.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2014 - 02:54pm PT
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I think Crunch is onto something. Make those sponsored climbers work at what they are not good at. Getting paid to play should be some work.
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Baggins
Boulder climber
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Aug 25, 2014 - 03:16pm PT
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Not sure I see the connection between the quality of magazine articles and the eloquence, or lack of, of sponsored climbers. Very few articles in print are written by pro climbers, usually their exploits are being covered by another writer, or it is an interview style.
I agree that the interview style highlights of sponsored climbers are boring as fvck tho.
BITD climbing exploits were new and unknown, these days the usual thing of a well known climber being shipped off to greenland or africa or somewhere has become such a well-worn groove that nobody really cares.
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skitch
climber
East of Heaven
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Aug 25, 2014 - 04:01pm PT
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Remember when climbing magazines were great.
Nope.
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Aug 25, 2014 - 04:43pm PT
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I one time attended a discussion at the Banff Mtn Book Fest about climbing and writing and the woman , at the time head of acquisitions for The Mountaineers, said without hesitation she would publish boring writing from a famous climber before she'd publish interesting writing from an unknown climber.
That's just fukkin' retarded.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Aug 25, 2014 - 04:44pm PT
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Obviously you were doing Good work, Tami! What Whinney little tire biters those companies can be!!
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Trad Larry
Gym climber
Black Canyon, Colorado
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Aug 25, 2014 - 05:14pm PT
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Anyone who doesn't think that Rock and Ice is the best climbing magazine out there isn't paying attention.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 25, 2014 - 05:24pm PT
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Crunch What changed?
rgold … are we becoming a worse audience?
I don’t know about worse, but different, certainly, at least us old ones who have been there and done that, repeatedly… there is nothing new under the sun for us. In a way, we've changed. But when we first started, we were hungry for anything we could get our hands on that would inform us as to what adventures were out there and how we might engage in our own adventures.
My own reading tends to skip the familiar and seek the unique, but that’s getting harder and harder to find.
There are some universal themes that never get tired, mostly having to do with personal experience and different points-of-view of those things familiar. I’m interested in other peoples’ view of something I’ve done or thought of…
but that’s just me.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2014 - 06:02pm PT
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My overall premise is that climbing magazines used to be better back in the day. It isn't that the people making them or doing the work nowadays are doing anything wrong as many of them are great writers and photographers. It's that the whole concept has somehow gone downhill. Too many adds, too much pandering to sponsors, and not enough actual climbing writing. Just because something has been written about one climb doesn't mean someone else can't give a very different perspective on the same climb and have it still be interesting.
I don't think the genie can be put back in the bottle, but some things could change. How about starting with putting one article in each issue by an unknown climber even if it's quite rough. They probably wouldn't even have to pay them, that seems right up their alley. How about partnering with supertopo pulling a story or thread that is interesting. Might improve the writing in both places. How about paying some of the awesome climbers from the past to write some interesting stories.
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ms55401
Trad climber
minneapolis, mn
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Aug 25, 2014 - 08:26pm PT
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those dissatisfied with mags might buy one of occasional Taco-poster Andy Kirkpatrick's books
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2014 - 08:31pm PT
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Kids these days.
No Jim b. they were packed with much more content, less ads, better paper.
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ms55401
Trad climber
minneapolis, mn
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Aug 25, 2014 - 08:36pm PT
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haha
I remember when Alpinist shrinked their product, and sprayed some canard about going green or using American labor
GODDAMN IT WHEN I WANT TO READ ABOUT BETH CALDWELL'S EXISTENTIAL JOURNEY TO SENDING HER PROJ I WANT IT ON WIDESCREEN DON'T GIVE A FUKK ABOUT TREES OR AMERICAN LABOR
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rick d
climber
ol pueblo, az
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Aug 25, 2014 - 08:42pm PT
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time to print is the issue.
the news is old if it happened last week let alone last month,printing photos is stupid easy, and the world is a smaller place with few new climbing areas.
...and people don't care.
all periodical print is doomed and advertisers know it.
and mike, I bought my last climbing magazine in 1986, bought issues of mountain up to the end, and reveled in the few issues of mountain review that came out.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Aug 25, 2014 - 09:59pm PT
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There ae several factors in play that thwart good writing in mags. First, no matter what people say, the big, important ascents are not debatable, and those are the ones many of us want to read about first and foremost. The lifestyle pieces are sometimes near and dear, but epic typically trumps cool. Second, many of those doing seminal ascents these days got sponsorship directly out of high school, if not before. And for an ambitious young climber, time on the rock generally trumps college, at least for a while. Ergo no college. Skilled writing is hard enough with an education, and becomes less and less likely for people schooled on Twitter and Facebook. So you end up with editors often doing much of the heavy lifiting by default, and quite naturally the pieces start feeling vaguely or blatantly selfsame.
JL
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Katie_I
Mountain climber
Wyoming
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Aug 25, 2014 - 10:20pm PT
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But at Alpinist, we don't only publish stories by sponsored athletes. I've worked with a wide range of talented writers, from all kinds of backgrounds, many of whom are (or were, until we published them extensively) unknown. I do have a commitment to helping emerging writers, because that's part of our responsibility--to help mentor others, as we have been mentored ourselves.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Aug 25, 2014 - 10:26pm PT
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I always wondered why rags like Time and Newsweek could cover events happening only a week before, yet climbing mags have a lag time measured in months.
Are they still setting type by hand? Using a Gutenberg press? Or what.
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Katie_I
Mountain climber
Wyoming
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Aug 25, 2014 - 10:38pm PT
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It depends on whether you're trying to cover "news" or create something that's a fully developed "story." "News" can be put together much more quickly and posted online (the lag time you see there, which may consist of days, has to do with climbing magazines having significantly smaller staffs than Time or Newsweek does).
It takes longer to craft a story, both in terms of the literary work and in terms of the research, the fact-checking (which with climbing stories can involve a huge amount of reading and interviewing to get esoteric facts right), the selection of photos and the care put into the layout in print.
"The value of information does not survive the moment in which it was new. It lives only at that moment; it has to surrender to it completely and explain itself to it without losing any time. A story is different. It does not expend itself. It preserves and concentrates its strength and is capable of releasing it even after a long time."--Walter Benjamin, "The Art of Storytelling," Illuminations
If your aim is to produce a work of art, it doesn't happen (generally) overnight.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Aug 25, 2014 - 11:07pm PT
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A few not necessarily linked thoughts.
The Alpinist website says its US$94.95 for eight issues = $11.85/copy, not $13. Which is less than twice the price of the monthlies.
A lot has to do with changes in the worlds of education, the economy, and communications. Simply put, it's now cheaper than ever to "publish" something, and information flows far more quickly. However, while the volume and velocity of information flow has greatly increased, the quality may not have. Lucid communication is a waning skill, for whatever reason(s). And there are fewer moderating intermediaries between writer and reader, for better or worse.
Ed H quoted:
Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story of that man skilled in all ways of contending, the wanderer, harried for years on end...
Perhaps the most famous travel book of all time, and perhaps the first. Anyone? This is important in that mountain writing is generally considered a genre of travel writing, by the literary mavens anyway.
Some of us not only read Mountain, we sometimes contributed to it, first to Ken Wilson, later to Tim Lewis, and then other of its editors. A few may have written for both Mountain and Alpinist, and perhaps other of the climbing magazines, journals, etc, so allowing some perspective. Ken was well known for his firm editorial views (chalk is evil!), his respect for facts, and soliciting a very wide variety of writers, many of them from other countries. When you consider the challenges of slow communications then, languages, and a bewildering variety of climbing venues, welding that into something lasting and entertaining was a formidable challenge.
So you'd write something for Ken, in say 1977. Something that you might rather not be reminded of now, but that's another story. Two or three weeks after sending it - if Ken was lucky, in a typed letter - you'd get a reply. Which often would politely dissect your report or essay, and ask you to do better. Which you did. That's what editors and other interlocutors have been doing since the dawn of time, wrestling and massaging writers and their writings into something readable and saleable.
There's absolutely nothing new about what Katie does - although her dedication to her craft is extraordinary. I do a lot of writing in various contexts, for some of which I get paid as such, and can safely say that. Sure, every editor and publication has her/his/its leanings in terms of what they're interested in, or at least think the readers are interested in, and how it ought to be presented. (The tendency of some publications toward endless, unnecessary, repetitive, redundant, superlative, excessive adjectives, chasing a noun - any noun! - to give them meaning, being an extreme case.) But such leanings are usually readily apparent. It's no secret that the New York Times is a traditional, somewhat conservative publication, with an east coast US perspective on the world, and a fanatic devotion to facts.
All editors put their own 'voice' on what is published, and how it is edited. The choice as to what will and won't be printed is as important or more so than the choice of how what is published will be edited. And the hapless reader doesn't usually know about the dogs that aren't barking. (Another snobby literary reference.)
The problems with travel literature now being that there's less and less that's truly new and interesting to write about, and that there's more and more information out there about it. When Mountain covered the first ascent of Kongur in 1981, the question for most was "where the hell is it?" Not an issue any more. We can in an instant learn just about all we could want to know. Plus people now have a lot more money for travel - the world really has gotten smaller. Leaving the publishers and so editor of a climbing magazine some unenviable choices. Go fully mass market, with lots of basic stuff with a large but not very sophisticated audience? Try to hang onto the traditional, balanced approach, knowing that the competition (often free) is ferocious? Keep a high quality approach, with a limited market?
Heaven knows where the world of publishing will be in five or ten years. But with the volume of information out there, about any conceivable subject, the role of editors if anything should be enhanced. As can be seen from the tedious rants here (politics! immunizations! terrorists! police brutality! arks on the moon!), an unmoderated discussion quickly deteriorates into infantile noise. Sure, it's important for us and for editors to be open to all views. But facts are sacred, and having people with the wisdom to somewhat filter what we eventually see, in whatever format. Just as we pay other professionals for their greater knowledge and skill, to filter out (e.g.) quackery from real medicine, so we should pay professionals to do so in publishing. If they're inept or slanted, it'll quickly become apparent.
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MH2
climber
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Aug 26, 2014 - 07:38am PT
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I like Alpinist. I like The New Yorker. I like turtles.
More turtle literature, please.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Aug 26, 2014 - 07:51am PT
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I don't think there has been much of a qualitative change in magazines over the past fifty years. Times change and what's being reported and the style of the reporting changes to.
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jstan
climber
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Aug 26, 2014 - 08:11am PT
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Daisy Duck, notwithstanding, I fall into Werner's camp. After Sheridan Anderson, Joe Kelsey, and Summit, one has had to temper the expectations. Running into occasional superb writing like the recent TR, on ST of all places, is just made that much more enjoyable.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Aug 26, 2014 - 09:23am PT
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I don't think there has been much of a qualitative change in magazines over the past fifty years.
Hmmm. I guess I might disagree with that a bit. No one's ever gone back to publish a "Summit's greatest hits" book, or, Off Belay. Some of the writing was "ok" and the subject matter, given the times, was titillating, but, most not that great.
Although the writing in the Summit resurrection was pretty fair.
The Best of Rock and Ice: An Anthology. 25 spellbinding essays! Ha ha.
I think there's been quality out there for the last fifty years, but, not consistantly like, say, Alpinist is today.
And, I do think most climbers who are writers do a fair job at their craft.
Great thread with great thoughts. Thanks!
Geez, even though I should be settin' in a chair with a snifter and some fine literature, I do find myself entertained by 'net chatter, or, chaff, as the case may be. Sound bite. Ugh.
Unlike DMT (we're about the same "vintage", ha ha), I still keep up on the rags. But, most spicy, controversial, wild news seems to break on the internet prior to being set into print. The virtual campfire.
Reading good climbing literature is a niche sport! There's too few to appreciate the few that are great at it...
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Magic Ed
Trad climber
Nuevo Leon, Mexico
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Aug 26, 2014 - 10:11am PT
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I noticed that the quality of the writing, and the magazines in general, declined drastically with the advent of sport climbing.
The writing used to be about adventure and emotions and then devolved into being about numbers.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Aug 26, 2014 - 11:07am PT
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The writing used to be about adventure and emotions and then devolved into being about numbers.
In parallel was a change in climbing photography. From photographs that were of big, scary cliffs, featuring puny, unidentifiable climbers, like this:
Puny climbers on an adventure into the unknown. Who are those people? What are they thinking? Are they scared?
To this:
A portrait. Cliff barely exists except as out-of-focus backdrop to focus attention on the climber. Rikki Ishoy might be pretty to look at, but it's eye candy. There's no story, no depth.
The best climbing writing of the 1970s and earlier, like Dickinson's photo, tried to capture something of the place of the climber within in the landscape. Can the experience of climbing create a more meaningful relationship with the landscape--and if so, can that deeper experience be conveyed to a wider audience in word or picture?
In the main climbing magazines, for a couple decades, the writing (and photography) have tended to focus inward, on personal growth, personal goals, individual attainment. Yes, numbers are part of this. How can they not be? How else for describing redpointing a 5.15 like Realization? The landscape itself becomes more a backdrop, a setting for an intense, personal, emotional drama.
Alpinist, to its credit, tries to capture the best of it all. To create something that transcends both. This was Beckwith's vision, one that we are very lucky to see continue under Katie Ives.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Aug 26, 2014 - 12:36pm PT
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voted the best cover shot in Climbing magazine history
That photo? Oh Gawd....
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Aug 26, 2014 - 12:43pm PT
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I bouldered with her once...
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c-plus
Trad climber
Vancouver, BC, Canada
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Aug 28, 2014 - 10:02pm PT
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Thank you Katie Ives for chiming in. I for one think Alpinist is awesome and am glad there's a mag out that still finds a story in the adventure of climbing and not just the grade.
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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Aug 28, 2014 - 10:14pm PT
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Big Mike
Trad climber
BC
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Aug 29, 2014 - 09:17am PT
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I've worked with a wide range of talented writers, from all kinds of backgrounds, many of whom are (or were, until we published them extensively) unknown. I do have a commitment to helping emerging writers, because that's part of our responsibility--to help mentor others, as we have been mentored ourselves.
As a rookie writer who's had the pleasure of publishing his first piece with Katie I can say that this is entirely true. I mostly worked with Matt who was amazing, but Katie had some insights for me as well and I value those lessons. With their help I was able to turn my trip report into an actual story. I felt my writing improved significantly throughout the process.
I'm currently working on something new, and have gone back to my emails with Matt and Katie as well as my article for inspiration to improve my style.
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