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)
Scribehound will be interesting; will the writing team actually push out of the lane, or will vested interests take hold? Will anyone dare to be controversial and risk the wrath of their industry colleagues and fellow Scribehound writers?
My guess is that the majority of writers will, “unleashed”, produce pretty much the same content for Scribehound that they would produce for anywhere else. There may well be no editorial guidelines (beyond the ‘don’t get sued’ guidelines we have here at GardenRant!) but the writing pool is made up of people who could find themselves with a lot to lose if they rock the boat too much. Writers won’t want to find themselves at odds with the consensus, and Scribehound will end up just like Gardens Illustrated and similar publications.
It would be very entertaining to discover that some of those writers had things they desperately wanted to say but had never been able to! That would be enlightening. And unlikely?
What I like about Garden Rant, as opposed to print magazines, is I get to see REAL gardens that haven’t been totally cleaned up, with all hints of imperfection removed. I get to hear difficulties you all have that I too have, and honest opinions about various plants that you might not like (even though I might love them!). I like the different styles of writing that I see from various contributors, whether technical, historical, or hysterical. Keep it honest, keep it blunt, keep it real.
That’s what I love to hear!
We started writing on our [Folsom lawn care] (https://www.lawncareup.com) services website but then stopped. I guess writing doesn’t come naturally to me.
Not everyone is a good writer. But now it’s possible and sometimes compulsory – Scribehound insist on writers adding a spoken version of their text) to say things, do videos and even, no doubt, get artificial intelligence to do it for you.
I will never forget a garden writer friend telling me (when I was sharing my annoyance about the influence of big companies on garden writing elsewhere) “Don’t forget Marianne, you write for Garden*RANT*, and words have consequences.” The honesty found here is definitely more loved by our readers than by our colleagues methinks. 🙂
It’s an excellent post Anne, and it makes me think of bringing your book to the ocean with me this weekend for past reflections in this vein (garden experts, etc.). I’ve had many similar thoughts about the old marketplace and the new, but I’m tempted to play devil’s advocate here instead of devoting a new post to my thoughts.
First, full disclosure, I’m a print girl if given choice. Vastly prefer reading print to reading screens. Better on my eyes, on my state of mind, and on my ability to absorb and be still with what I am reading and thinking about. I keep the amount of subscriptions low so I can enjoy the ones that I have.
Here are my issues with the loss of the big gatekeepers (editors/publishers). A good editor is worth their weight in solid gold as they are exceedingly rare. They recognize one’s voice and tighten it, not erase it. I often wish we had one of these beautiful unicorns on staff at GR, but that is completely impossible as there is little gold to give them.
Gatekeepers meant there was less to read – which of course has all the problems you illustrate above, but also has a plus side. Less meant more. More nutrition in the writing (so to speak). We are faced with an excess of non-nutritive calories that we absorb the same way we munch salty snacks — mindlessly.
And it must be recognized that, even when the major gatekeepers held the gates, there were still many smaller publishers of journals and books that found incredible voices and published them. After all, your Bad Tempered Gardener made it, and that’s not mainstream “Big Grin” writing.
Online, the big houses have just as much voice-erasing editing going on, and worse, they have to add the dreaded SEO to the mix. So writers don’t get to play with obscure titles etc. and our text is peppered with key words we otherwise wouldn’t use, and headers we also wouldn’t use, leading to a lot of stale and same-y writing. The marketplace is about clicks and eyes on ads and that changes what is valued – and more importantly, what is written about.
If you find your tribe – or they find you – as in the case of GardenRant or ThinkinGardens or other blogs that have been around before the system inevitably became gamed for those who know how to game it, then you are able to work and write in the world that you love (though more editing would be fabulous and so would a decent wage). Substack is perhaps there now, but will, inevitably I think, bring us back to the problems with blogs.
And then there is the big problem with Influencers – and the problem is growing bigger I fear. It cannot help but have a massive affect on what gets spoken, written, and videoed about – and what doesn’t. That means plants without press, tools without press, simple products without press, invisible to a generation that works and lives increasingly in terms of brands and the influencers that promote them (even as that generation struggles with money and financial security).
But can you blame the Writer turned Influencer? With the loss of the gatekeepers, so many of the columnist and staff writer salaries are all but gone. Those jobs don’t even exist to shoot for – so how do you make a living? You make a living by selling products. You become the marketing arm of whatever companies will have you, and who want to leverage the audience you’ve gathered. In my mind that erases any “authenticity” you’ve built your own ‘brand’ on.
My hope for the new marketplace – perhaps in part fueled by Substack et al – is that readers and audiences will realize that independence is worth paying for. Find the voices you love and support them with subscriptions. And that may be a big journal with a large subscription price that gives you the news you need, or it could be a Substack like yours or mine (under construction for the new year), or Ben’s, with a very small outlay per month. Or it could be right here at GardenRant, navigating our third-party ads with grace, and recognizing that this small revenue is what keeps us able to host the site and remain independent of influence. (or influencer :))
Anyway, far too much for a comment, but wanted to chime in! xMW
I go with your hope, Marianne, including that Substack remains ad free, independent, editor free (I’m not as keen as you) and SEO free.
I did get Bad Tempered Gardener published, but Francis Lincoln also told me they would never publish a book like Vista https://shorturl.at/oMLIc again. Which is sad.
I’m delighted to go with the tide, as I’m convinced it will not reverse and will give new voices and ideas opportunity. Hurray for Garden Rant – it saved my sanity, I think. But I’m sorry if it has cost you. Perhaps the normalisation of unfettered writing will kill that prejudice.
O – and I love a screen. I get books on screen now, as clutching the weight and size of a ‘proper’ book feels too clunky, especially in bed. BUT I get pennies out of my own books in ebook version, pounds for the paper ones. Swings and roundabouts?
J’adore Anne Wareham!
Merci bien!
I love Garden Rant, the diverse voices and views, but maybe Substack is worth considering esp if you can offer subscriptions that give you a living wage but don’t break your readers ‘ budgets.
That’s the Substack challenge. Besides getting subscribers at all!
I for one am ready for real photos. I’m developing an interest (er, a new obsession) with day lilies, so lots of googling is going on. How many times have I seen a faded flower in the frame? Almost never, even though they go over literally EVERY DAY.
That would be useful. I have real problems when we visit gardens getting Charles to take pictures of anything which is less than perfect. Understandably, because he can only sell photos of perfect plants and perfect looking bits of garden.
Thank you for being Anne.
I second that comment! Garden Rant is my favorite site. Thanks to all who write.
Great! So good to know that. Thank you.
That’s very kind, Allen. Xx
Love this post… whenever I see a cover of The English Garden, I say out loud, “Why can’t our magazines have photography like this!” I also yell “Cows!” when I see cows in the field.
I love to write yet…am being dragged into – need to be an influencer! More “Instagram followers needed, add more to your blog, get more Facebook friends, start posting on your You Tube channel” messages….
I DON’T want to! I will…but when I have something to promote. Let me write!
Anyone else in this conundrum?
Barbara
(a Garden Rant person since the start)
Don’t think of promoting or being an influencer, for heaven’s sake.
Maybe you could simply join the conversations on Substack and find what you want or need to write?