Books › Blue Book v57 n04 [1933-08], 1933 › scan 4
Scan 4
Blue Book v57 n04 [1933-08], 1933
44 lines. Read by computer on 18 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1Prize Offer for your Real Experiences
3IT has been said that there is material for a novel in every person's life. Whether this is true or not, we do believe that in the lives of most of us some experience has occurred sufficiently exciting to merit description in print. With this idea in mind we shall be pleased to receive and to print true stories of real experience, running from one thousand to four thousand words each. For each of the five best of these received each month we will pay, according to our appraisal of its length and strength, $50 or more.
5In theme the stories may deal with adventure, mystery, sport, humor,—especially humor!—war or business. Sex is barred. Manuscripts should be addressed to the Real Experience Editor, the Blue Book Magazine, 230 Park Ave., New York, N. Y. Preferably but not necessarily they should be typewritten, and should be accompanied by a stamped and self-addressed envelope for use in case the story is unavailable.
7A pen name may be used if desired, but in all cases the writer's real name and permanent address should accompany the manuscript. Be sure to write your name and correct address in the upper left-hand corner of the first page of your story, and keep a copy as insurance against loss of the original; for while we handle manuscripts with great care, we cannot accept responsibility for their return. As this is a monthly contest, from one to two months may elapse before you receive a report on your story.
9$900 for Odd Moments
11"Perhaps you at the school would be glad to know that during the past year my earnings from news stories and a few short features were around $900. While that is not a large amount of money, it has been earned in odd moments after my housework was done."
12Mrs. Mae L. Harland,
13Doylestown, Wis.
15How do you know you can't WRITE?
17Have you ever tried?
18Have you ever attempted even the least bit of training, under competent guidance?
19Or have you been sitting back, as it is so easy to do, waiting for the day to come some time when you will awaken, all of a sudden, to the discovery, "I am a writer"?
20If the latter course is the one of your choosing, you probably never will write. Lawyers must be law clerks. Doctors must be internes. Engineers must be draftsmen. We all know that, in our times, the egg does come before the chicken.
21It is seldom that any one becomes a writer until he (or she) has been writing for some time. That is why so many authors and writers spring up out of the newspaper business. The day-to-day necessity of writing—of gathering material about which to write—develops their talent, their background and their confidence as nothing else could.
22That is why the Newspaper Institute of America bases its writing instruction on journalism—continuous writing—the training that has produced so many successful authors.
24Learn to write by writing
26NEWSPAPER Institute training is based on the New York Copy-Desk Method. It starts and keeps you writing in your own home, on your own time. Week by week you receive actual assignments, just as if you were right at work on a great metropolitan daily. Your writing is individually corrected and constructively criticized. A group of men with 182 years of newspaper experience behind them are responsible for this instruction. Under such sympathetic guidance, you will find that (instead of vainly trying to copy some one else's writing tricks) you are rapidly developing your own distinctive, self-flavored style—undergoing an experience that has a thrill to it and which at the same time develops in you the power to make your feelings articulate.
27Many people who should be writing become awe-struck by fabulous stories about millionaire authors and, therefore, give little thought to the $25, $50 and $100 or more that can often be earned for material that takes little time to write—stories, articles on business, fads, travels, sports, recipes, etc.—things that can easily be turned out in leisure hours, and often on the impulse of the moment.
29How you start
31We have prepared a unique Writing Aptitude Test. This tells you whether you possess the fundamental qualities necessary to successful writing—acute observation, dramatic instinct, creative imagination, etc. You'll enjoy taking this test. The coupon will bring it, without obligation. Newspaper Institute of America, 1776 Broadway, New York.
33Newspaper Institute of America
341776 Broadway, New York
36Send me, without cost or obligation, your Writing Aptitude Test and further information about writing for profit, as promised in Blue Book, August.
37Mr. ____________________________
38Mrs. ____________________________
39Miss ____________________________
40Address _________________________
41(All correspondence confidential. No salesmen will call on you.) 68H363
43Why don't you write?
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.