Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Introduction
H
ERE ARE TWO
facts I learned long ago about travel writing:
1. There is no story in the world so marvelous that it cannot be told boringly.
2. There is no story in the world so boring that it cannot be told marvelously.
To prove the first point, I will provide you with an example from my own personal and
painful experience. Long ago, back when Bill Clinton was president and the earth was new, I
worked as a writer at
GQ
magazine. It was a great job. This was still in the days before the
Internet undid the magazine business—back when editors of the big glossies could still afford
to send writers on long, expensive trips in order to write long, expensive stories about long,
expensive subjects. Thus, my editors very expensively sent me a long way off to New Zeal-
and to write about an obsessed scientist who was hunting for the fabled giant squid in the very
deepest and most unexplored trenches of the Pacific Ocean. (This was way before there was
any video footage of the giant squid to be found on the Internet, such as one can easily find
today. Back then, nobody had ever yet seen one of these magnificent creatures alive.)
I was in my 20s and had a tendency toward lazy shortcuts, and probably this is why I de-
cided—in advance of even boarding the plane to New Zealand—that this story was basically
going to write itself. Really, all I had to do was sort of show up, and everything would clearly
fall into place, right? Because look at the elements: Mysterious sea creature! Obsessed scient-
ist! Unexplored crevices in the deepest trenches of the ocean! I wouldn't even have to phone
this one in; I could just sort of
mumble
it in, without even bothering to pick up the phone. So
I went to New Zealand, and I had a great time. I drank a lot of beer and hung out with sailors
andtookadayofftogosnorkelingwithdolphinsjustformyownpleasure.ThenIcamehome
and wrote the story of the giant squid in about two days—
BAM
, done. Nailed it! Easy peasy.
What's next? Where's my next plane ticket?
But my editor (the indomitable Ilena Silverman, who now presides over writers at the
New
York Times Magazine
) didn't love the story. She found the story to be, as they maddeningly
and constantly say in the magazine business, “not yet there.” She gave me some thoughtful
and careful advice for how to get the piece there, and I dutifully plugged in her ideas and re-
turnedthestorytoherafewdayslater.Shestilldidn'tlikeit.Sheaskedmetorewriteitagain.
I rewrote it. I took two weeks this time. But she still didn't like it. She didn't like my next
rewrite either. Nor the next. Nor the next.
Now,IlenaSilvermanisnotaneditorwhowastespeople'stime,soIknewshewasn'tmess-
ing with me on this. She was earnestly searching for ways to help me make this story come
alive, but even she seemed uncertain as to precisely what magic was missing from my prose.
