Get Your "Modern Love" Published—Or Improve Its Chances
In preparation for my first self-guided class, I read scores of Modern Love essays. For those who haven’t heard of it, Modern Love is the popular NYT weekly column, which has spawned countless books since its inception in 2004. For the class, I didn’t only read all of the essays from this year, and essays about the essays, but a lot of attempts at the Modern Love by clients and students.
And I learned a LOT of surprising things along the way. One of the most important things I learned, or maybe re-learned, is the importance of having or finding a clear, communicable concept.
You need to make your story/essay pitchable; even if you’re not pitching. A pitch is a short, snappy, and easily understandable description of a work that intrigues the listener or reader. It’s a clear concept that makes sense right away, without a lot of backstory or explanation. It makes the listener or reader want—no, insist—on reading your work.
I’d argue this is true for anyone working on a short story, essay, or article, really any short piece of prose.
The editors of the Modern Love column don’t accept pitches, but it’s also clear that they don’t accept essays that are difficult to pitch.
I often ask students and clients how they’d briefly describe their short essay (or short story, for that matter). If they struggle to locate a “pitch,” it’s time to back up and work on clarifying the idea on that level. You can’t really write a piece until it’s pitchable. Learn more in the Writing Your Modern Love class, and below.
What Does Pitchable Mean?
As a writer, I want to know what is the core of the piece, what is the hook, or the most relevant, and appealing aspect of the piece. Often it’s a kind of synopsis, but sometimes it’s related to the piece’s takeaway, or relevance. What is the piece doing that is interesting, or different? How strange does it get?
You should be able to “pitch” your story or essay in just a few sentences, adding up to a short paragraph. You may even be able to do it in a sentence.
Here’s a pitch for a short story I recently finished:
Harlan orders a 23-and-Me test against his lonly, interoverted twin’s strong objections, to find the twins’ biological parents). The results are surprising: their father was a “prolific donor” who made deposits and countless sperm banks around the world, and as a result they have hundreds of siblings that they never knew about. They decide to track him down.
An essay I wrote for Granta online:
While working as a bartender at a divy pool hall called Babes Billiards, I befriended a pool hustler named “Crackhead Rob,” who taught me how to beat a better player than me. Ultimately, during my time at Babes, I learned that I don’t belong among the barflies, and that I’m more dangerous than I realized.
I could do this for any piece I’ve ever written. my Modern Love:
During my divorce, I had to exhume the old antique furniture hidden in our basement, all swathed in bubble wrap. At that table and chairs, my parents had hosted countless raucous dinner parties, but when my mother died, when I was 11, the table fell silent, and was hidden away. Now I had to bring it out of the darkness, and find a way forward, bringing the giant table into my life, and learning to make peace with my past.
How do I make my story or essay pitchable?
To do this, I simply imagine I’m trying to describe the piece, concisely, to a friend, or even just an editor of a magazine. What is the most salient idea here? What is most interesting?
Some basic premises:
Be Specific
Really specific! I’ve seen “It’s about reconnecting with my dad.” Okay…but why were they disconnected? What did they do to reconnect? How long were they disconnected? Make it sound dramatic by being specific. Give us the details that make it more intense.
Do not hide the drama
For some reason, many people want to hide their hook. Perhaps they think it’s their best thing, so they want to hide it and spring it on the reader later. You can’t hide it. This is a savagely competitive business, and no one is going to make it halfway through the first page if they don’t immediately know what’s exciting here.
My father was arrested for bank robbery when I was in middle school, and I refused to visit him in prison, but now, after twenty years of estrangement, I sought him out.
All the cards are on the table RIGHT away. There are some very rare exceptions…but basically, no, shoot it all at once.
Focus On what’s meaningful to your reader
This is central to my writing process, too. I often start with a draft that’s full of stuff that I care about. The first draft of my Modern Love was full of info about the table and chairs I inherited and the process of getting them restored…this was interesting to me, but it’s not emotionally potent stuff.
As I wrote, I discovered the underlying meaning of my essay, which was more universal—how this table represented past experiences with family and community and how the table’s restoration offered promise.
Once I did the synopsis and made it interesting for the reader, it was clear I had to rewrite the story around the emotionally meaningful stuff.
What is Modern Love rejects my piece? Should I send it out elsewhere?
Yes, definitely. There are MANY places to send your personal essay. I’ve created a list of 42 markets (magazines, newspapers, literary journals) that I think are superb, to learn more about my list, click HERE.