Youth? Beauty? Passion? Honesty? A Big Grin?
Many years ago I wrote a piece for Gardens Illustrated about a late season border. I may have already told you, but I suggested that the best way to keep your border looking good might be shopping. I described how you might note a dead space and give yourself a treat down at a local nursery. Great to be able to see something in flower before you stick it in.
The sub editor took this out. They couldn’t cope with the indelicacy of‘ shopping’. And that kind of deadly thinking still haunts garden writing in print. There are things people will not be saying and they’re not necessarily political and undiverse, just not acceptable for smiley, happy gardeners.
Of course there is always a consistent content style, an approach which has Gardens Illustrated differing from Amateur Gardening, for a different audience. But all must be positive, administered with a smiley face. Ideally youthful and passionate. Plant loving. It helps if you’re a garden designer, for Gardens Illustrated.
I got fed up of the formulaic writing I used to do and Charles, as photographer, got fed up of dealing with editors.
The system is – or was – a set of garden flattering photos is placed in front of an editor and if there was a suitable space (eg for an autumn set) the writer would be sent off, whatever the season at this point, to go and interview the garden owners and then write a sweet talking report on them and their garden. (You can imagine I was not that good at that) Then everyone would be waiting for months (even years) for publication. I think AI will be doing all this kind of garden writing soon.
Sweet! My deathless prose.
When blogging came along a new world opened up.
So now we have, perhaps, two kinds of garden writing. (Alongside veggie stuff which I know nothing of.) The magazine/newspaper print sort. And the rest, online.
This is of the rest. Here we can be blunt, if we dare. What do readers, used to the passionate beaming face and relentless positivity make of blunt?
We can go on and on and on about our own garden. Or be rude about someone else’s. How are we doing without an editor cutting down too lengthy pieces and no-one correcting our spelling except perhaps an algorithm. Vitis cognitive anyone? We can be boring without having our piece bounced back. We don’t have to have a particular content style, or even a particular content. We don’t have to follow the current fashions. You could hate bees. You might lose subscribers.
And – wonderful – you can hear directly from your readers and talk to them. That is very special and I love it. The ‘garden expert’ pontificating to a passive audience is passé. We have to be willing to engage now.
Some of our work, proudly displayed in Charles’s office.
This is a kind of revolution.
Prestige still lives with the paper world (and its online editions), I think. People still want a column in something that might flop through someone’s letterbox. Just as we probably still want to have our books published. Freedom from the editor and publisher is not total or everywhere. But a largely undiscussed horticultural revolution has occurred.
It has many effects. I think on Instagram, for example, it has led to a lot of nonsense about gardening being promoted by beaming, in your face, Influencers. I’m not happy about that. But we can freely discuss our experiences, talk about bad garden practice as well as good, talk about bad plants as well as good, bad gardens as well as good. So there is good writing and bad writing. There is nonsense and wisdom all jumbled up.
It seems , for example, that Scribehound is about to attempt to give all the old familiar paper writers their freedom. It will feature them in “conversations driven by passionate writers without the influence of editors, advertisers or proprietors.” That’s some admission of what we’ve been being served by them up to now. Will they have something new to say if unleashed?
Are we benefiting from the new freedoms we do have? Are we enjoying and appreciating them? Are we using them to our best advantage? Are our gardens benefiting?
I am. I’m loving it. I’m fascinated. Where will it all go? Will the paper piles vanish?
The paper they used! The space they take up. (chuck them out, Charles)
What do we Want from Garden Writers? originally appeared on GardenRant on October 10, 2024.
The post What do we Want from Garden Writers? appeared first on GardenRant.
