Who now are rated as successes on the roll call of those cub reporter days? Not our geniuses, but a dozen fellows who had the most determination and perseverance. The men who won were the men who tried, and tried again and then kept on trying.
Mr. Dooley was quite right about opportunity: "Opporchunity knocks at every man's dure wanst. On some men's dures it hammers till it breaks down the dure and goes in an' wakes him up if he's asleep, an' aftherward it works fur him as a night watchman. On other men's dures it knocks an' runs away; an' on the dures of other men it knocks, an' whin they come out it hits thim over the head with an ax. But eviry wan has an opporchunity. So yez had better kape your eye skinned an' nab it before it shlips by an' is lost forevir."
The names on a big magazine's table of contents represent many varieties of the vicissitudes of fortune, but the prevailing type is not a lucky genius, one for whom Opporchunity is working as a night watchman. The type is a firm-jawed plugger. His nose is keen for "good stories," his eye equally alert to dodge the ax or to nab Opporchunity's fleeting coat-tails.
CHAPTER II
HOW TO PREPARE A MANUSCRIPT
If you have a real "story" up your sleeve and know how to word it in passable English, the next thing to learn is the way to prepare a manuscript in professional form for marketing. In the non-fiction writer's workshop only two machines are essential to efficiency and economy. The first of these, and absolutely indispensable, is a typewriter. The sooner you learn to type your manuscripts, the better for your future and your pocketbook.
It is folly to submit contributions in handwriting to a busy editor who has to read through a bushel of manuscripts a day. The more legible the manuscript, the better are your chances to win a fair reading. I will go further, and declare that a manuscript which has all the earmarks of being by a professional is not only more carefully read, but also is likely to be treated with more consideration when a decision is to be made upon its value to the publisher in dollars and cents. Put yourself in the editor's place and you will quickly enough grasp the psychology of this.
The editor knows that no professional submits manuscripts in handwriting, that no professional writes upon both sides of the sheet, and that no professional omits to enclose an addressed stamped envelope in which to return the manuscript to its author if it proves unavailable for the magazine's use. Why brand yourself as a novice even before the manuscript reader has seen your first sentence? Remember you are competing for editorial attention against a whole bushel of other manuscripts. The girl who opens the magazine's mail may be tempted to cast your contribution into the rejection basket on general principles, if you are foolish enough to get away to such a poor start. What an ignominious end to your literary adventure is this—and all because you were careless, or didn't know any better!