In some fields, such as cooking, sewing, teaching, the care of children, and household management, woman's greater knowledge and understanding of conditions furnish her with topics that are vital to other women and often not uninteresting to men. The entry of women into occupations hitherto open only to men is bringing new experiences to many women, and is furnishing women writers with additional fields from which to draw subjects and material. Ever since the beginning of popular magazines and of special feature writing for newspapers, women writers have proved their ability, but at no time have the opportunities for them been greater than at present.
CHAPTER II
PREPARATION FOR SPECIAL FEATURE WRITING
Qualifications for Feature Writing. To attain success as a writer of special feature articles a person must possess at least four qualifications: (1) ability to find subjects that will interest the average man and woman, and to see the picturesque, romantic, and significant phases of these subjects; (2) a sympathetic understanding of the lives and interests of the persons about whom and for whom he writes; (3) thoroughness and accuracy in gathering material; (4) skill to portray and to explain clearly, accurately, and attractively.
The much vaunted sense of news values commonly called a "nose for news," whether innate or acquired, is a prime requisite. Like the newspaper reporter, the writer of special articles must be able to recognize what at a given moment will interest the average reader. Like the reporter, also, he must know how much it will interest him. An alert, responsive attitude of mind toward everything that is going on in the world, and especially in that part of the world immediately around him, will reveal a host of subjects. By reading newspapers, magazines, and books, as well as by intercourse with persons of various classes, a writer keeps in contact with what people are thinking and talking about, in the world at large and in his own community. In this way he finds subjects and also learns how to connect his subjects with events and movements of interest the country over.
Not only should he be quick to recognize a good subject; he must be able to see the attractive and significant aspects of it. He must understand which of its phases touch most closely the life and the interests of the average person for whom he is writing. He must look at things from "the other fellow's" point of view. A sympathetic insight into the lives of his readers is necessary for every writer who hopes to quicken his subject with vital interest.
The alert mental attitude that constantly focuses the writer's attention on the men and women around him has been called "human curiosity," which Arnold Bennett says "counts among the highest social virtues (as indifference counts among the basest defects), because it leads to the disclosure of the causes of character and temperament and thereby to a better understanding of the springs of human conduct." The importance of curiosity and of a keen sense of wonder has been emphasized as follows by Mr. John M. Siddall, editor of the American Magazine, who directed his advice to college students interested in the opportunities afforded by writing as a profession:
A journalist or writer must have consuming curiosity about other human beings—the most intense interest in their doings and motives and thoughts. It comes pretty near being the truth to say that a great journalist is a super-gossip—not about trivial things but about important things. Unless a man has a ceaseless desire to learn what is going on in the heads of others, he won't be much of a journalist—for how can you write about others unless you know about others?
In journalism men are needed who have a natural sense of wonder.... You must wonder at man's achievements, at man's stupidity, at his honesty, crookedness, courage, cowardice—at everything that is remarkable about him wherever and whenever it appears. If you haven't this sense of wonder, you will never write a novel or become a great reporter, because you simply won't see anything to write about. Men will be doing amazing things under your very eyes—and you won't even know it.