Way back in the depths of time (i.e. clearly October 2011), I used to be Editor of a music blog called Paper-Deer. I had a team of about fifteen totally awesome Melbourne peeps reviewing gigs and records, and shooting gigs. I had to put it in hiatus due to my job at Get Glossy* but I’ve kept the website up for everyone’s Internet-viewing-pleasure. Just a heads up that the URL has now changed to www.paper-deer.com.au!
Melbourne Writers Festival is in the swing of things, and I attended ‘The Art of Editing‘ seminar today. The very amusing and intelligent Henry Finder, Editorial Director of The New Yorker, walked us through the history of his beloved publication plus some of his own editorial direction pointers… Usually with TIME Magazine illustrating his DO NOT DOs. Here are two Finder gems I jotted down from today:
Stop asking, ‘What must I cut?’ and start asking, ‘What must I keep?’
At The New Yorker, our commas travel in pairs for protection. (I feel like I need to add an extra comma in there.)
This month marks my ONE YEAR anniversary at Get Glossy. Still absolutely loving my job (maybe as long as you don’t ask me that during report week) and can’t imagine a nicer bunch of people to work with. My current clients include Biozet Attack, Australis Cosmetics, John Frieda Haircare, Bioré Skincare and Baby Bunting.
Feel free to send me some anniversary greeting cards in the mail.
Yes, time for the nerd in me to get excited. I’ve just bought my ticket to ‘The Art of Editing‘ with Henry Finder at Melbourne Writers Festival. Henry is the Editorial Director of The New Yorker, and I will have the pleasure of listening to this fine man talk about feature writing and reporting. More excited/geeky updates to come.
* Pictures taken from the MWF website.
I was super excited about the Emerging Writers’ Festival. So excited. Then I went and I was a bit disappointed.
The first event I went to was Seven Enviable Lines, which was mildly entertaining. Lawrence Leung was a well-rehearsed riot as always and Ali Alizadeh was (to put it in one word) awesome. I booked tickets to this shindig purely because I thought Mister Leung would be fun to watch again. Iknew I wasn’t going to really learn anything from this event… and I didn’t.
Next up was The Pitch – this one I didn’t enjoy so much. A couple of years ago when I was doing lots of music journalism, I really wanted to stretch myself and do some non-music articles. The only problem? I had trouble thinking of great story ideas, and then didn’t know how to present them. This event should have been an absolute gem for me but it really wasn’t. The first half showcased some of Australia’s top university publications, with their respective editors talking up their magazines. The second half was pretty much the same, but for other publications and websites like Crikey, Voiceworks and Meanjin. These are all amazing publications but all the advice soundbites from the editors were pretty common sense. We were told to make sure we’ve actually read the publication, that we are correctly addressing the publication (you have no idea how many times I received emails at Paper-Deer that were addressed to other music blogs) and other really obvious things. I am really not sure why the audience around me was taking notes so furiously. Perhaps I’m too harsh, or perhaps the Emerging Writers’ Festival this year was aimed at really ‘emerging’ writers.
PS Sorry this post is a bit on the tardy side!
One of the loveliest things about Melbourne – besides the gorgeous green and gold trams, and Jungle Juice’s vegetarian bagels – is its lively literary calendar. After all, Melbourne was the second city in the world to be named a City of Literature. The Emerging Writers’ Festival has just announced its 2012 event program, so I’ve booked tickets to two events. Will keep you posted – I may go nuts and buy tickets to everything and tell my bosses I contracted Ross River Fever from my weekend in, erm, Frankston.
I’ve just started my book blog. After a lot of random word generators and disapproving looks from my boyfriend, I ended up with the name ‘The Foxing’. Which the de facto still hated but I liked it. Anyway, you can check out The Foxing here. It’s still new and I haven’t quite figured out the layout and colour scheme yet so it’s a bit ‘rough’ around the edges. Oh, and yes. It’s a wordpress.com because this is just a fun personal side project and not a professional one.
It’s been about a month and a half since the last Paper-Deer blog post, and it’s been absolutely lovely. I can now chill out on weeknights baking and watching movies with my significant other, and hang out at bars until the wee hours of the morning on the weekends. But I’m getting a bit bored. I may be thinking of starting a fun little book blog because I am an avid reader/nerd (depending on how you look at it) but I’ll let you know when it happens.
Now… to think of a great book blog name.
I posted the final Paper-Deer post last week. All I have to say is that I am incredibly sad… but also amazingly relieved and relaxed. As to whether this ‘indefinite hiatus’ is permanent or more of the John Farnham-variety, I’m not sure.
I’ve decided that Paper-Deer should go on a hiatus (read the Farewell note I wrote on the blog).
I have been thinking of doing this for some time, but officially decided that Paper-Deer should have a bit of a break last week for a number of reasons. I guess the biggest one is that I originally started the blog to get more editing experience and to add to my portfolio so I could increase my chances of a writing/editing job… then it kind of took over to the point where I actually turned down paid a few paid editorships solely because it would be conflict of interest and I didn’t want to give up my baby. I also feel like I’ve been working non-stop since I moved to Melbourne in 2006 and haven’t had a chance to really relax and enjoy life. And one of the other main reasons is that I’m totally loving my job (at a marketing firm). After a while, coming home from work and having to edit a huge list of articles, read through 100 pressers and co-ordinate a handful of interviews started becoming a chore. And my mother says if something starts to feel like a chore, ditch it. Apart from the housework obviously. (My mum is a very clever lady.)
I have already emailed a lot of my music industry contacts who were involved with the blog, and all of my contributors too, but I’ll say it again here: thanks for all of your support with the blog! I’ll definitely keep the blog live for some time so it’ll be up for everyone to see even though we won’t be active. If you have the burning desire to contact any of my contributors or to ask me any questions, feel free to contact me!
Farewell… Sorta…
