The Wisdom of Jay Stowe, part 1

As a Cincinnati Magazine intern, I occasionally have the pleasure of having lunch or coffee with one of the more experienced journalists there. I try to take notes and learn as much as I can during these brief advisory sessions, and I usually emerge with some interesting things to think about. My most recent meeting was with Jay Stowe, the editor of the magazine.

We talked for a while about whole lot of things, but there was one particular insight he shared with me that I thought might be of interest to the rest of you.

After having talked about his many past experiences in journalism, which include working at Spin, Esquire, and The New York Observer, I asked him something that had long been on my mind. If I remember correctly, I said something like:

"Do you ever get to the point where you generally feel like 'Yeah, I'm pretty good at this?' I mean, most of the time when I finish writing something, I find myself thinking 'Does this suck? Do I suck?' Do you ever get to the point where you know for sure that you're consistently good at writing?"

Stowe responded by saying that the sense of self doubt I was talking about was actually a good thing. He said the anxiety pushes writers to get better and continue to challenge themselves. Having worked at big New York periodicals with journalists that thought of themselves as "great writers," Stowe had seen what happens when writers get so full of themselves they assume they can just phone it in without pouring the hard work into it that a less confident writer would. The result would often be really crappy writing from people with huge reputations and even bigger egos.

Feeling that anxiety, he explained, meant that the writer still cares about his work. When you think your Superman and don't care, it comes through in your writing - readers can sense the apathy radiating off of the page.

Maybe in some ways, suspecting you're a failure can actually be a good thing. Something to think about.

~Geoffrey Dobbins
Vice President, UCABJ