ROY PETER CLARK: Fourteen Traits of Good Writers

TRAIT 1
Good writers see the world as their journalism laboratory, a storehouse of story ideas. If they can
get out of the room, they can find a story.

TRAIT 2
Good writers prefer to discover and develop their own story ideas. They have an eye for the offbeat
and may find conventional assignments tedious.

TRAIT 3
Good writers are voracious collectors of information. This usually means that they take notes like
crazy.

TRAIT 4
Good writers spend too much time and creative energy working on their leads. They know that the
lead is the most important part of their work, the passage that invites the reader into the story and
signals the news.

TRAIT 5
Good writers talk about “immersing themselves” into the story. They live it, breathe it, and dream it.

TRAIT 6
Most good writers are bleeders rather than speeders. When they write, in the words of sportswriter
Red Smith, they “open a vein.”

TRAIT 7
Good writers understand that an important part of writing is the mechanical drudgery of
organizing the material, what Saul Pett describes as “donkey work.”

TRAIT 8
Good writers rewrite. They love computer terminals, which permit maximum playfulness during
revision.

TRAIT 9
In judging their work, good writers tend to trust their ears and their feelings more than their eyes.
Editors “look for holes in the story.” Writers want „to make it sing.”

TRAIT 10
Good writers want to tell stories. They are constantly searching for the human side of the news, for
voices that enliven the writing.

TRAIT 11
Good writers write primarily to please themselves and to meet their own exacting standards, but
they also understand that writing is a transaction between writer and reader.

TRAIT 12
Good writers take chances in their writing. They love the surprising and the unconventional approach
to a story.

TRAIT 13
Good writers are lifelong readers, mostly novels, and they like movies. They collect story ideas and
forms from other genres.

TRAIT 14
Good writers write too long, and they know it. They want their stories to be “seamless” or “connected
by a single thread” or “to flow.”
News Defined
News is an oral or written report of a past, present, or future event. It should be factual, truthful,
accurate, unbiased, and interesting. But what is interesting to one is not always interesting to another

Elements of News
 Conflict –this may involve physical or mental conflict – man versus man, man versus
animals, man versus nature, or man versus himself.
 Immediacy or timeliness – This element emphasizes the newest angle of the story. The
more recent the event, the more interesting it is to the reader.
 Proximity or nearness – This may refer to geographical nearness as well as to nearness of
kinship or interest.
 Prominence – Some people are more prominent than others by reasons of wealth, social
position, or achievements.
 Significance – Whatever is significant to the life of an individual is interesting to him.
 Names – Important names make important news.
 Drama – this adds color to the story. The more picturesque the background and the more
dramatic the actions are, the more appealing the story is to the reader.
 Oddity or unusualness – This refers to strange or unnatural events, objects, persons, and
places. An odd story is interesting not because of its news value but because of the human-
interest side of it.
 Romance and adventure – The romance of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton had
hugged headlines for many years. Romance may be experienced with other things. There
were the romance of Hemingway with the sea and of the astronauts with space.
 Sex – Since the dawn of history, sex has always interested man. Stories of sex are usually
related to stories of romance, marriage, divorce, and the varied activities of men with
women. This is not always the case
 Progress – The onward and forward march of civilization or the progress of a country is
chronicled step by step in the newspaper. The trend today is towards development
communication. Reports on the significant changes in the established order and on scientific
achievements are in order.
 Animals – Stories of animals, especially those with talents are good reading matter because
of their human-interest value.
 Number – Sweepstakes numbers, vital statistics, election results, scores in games,
casualties, fatalities, price of goods, and ages of women make good news.
 Emotion – All the other elements of news mentioned above appeal to the emotion. But the
term emotion here includes the various human responses such as the innate desire for food,
clothing, shelter; the universal interest in children, animals, and nature; and the natural
feeling of love, sympathy and generosity, of fear, hatred, and jealousy.

Types of News Stories

1. Scope or origin
 Local news – Report of events that take place within the immediate locality.
 National news – News that takes place within the country.
 Foreign news – News that takes place outside the country.
 Dateline news – News preceded by the date and place of origin or place where it
was written or filed: Tokyo, Jan. 20(AP)

2. Chronology or sequence
 Advance or anticipated – News published before its occurrence, sometimes called
dope or prognostication. The reporter foretells events expected to occur at a definite
time in the future.
  Spot news – News that is gathered and reporter on the spot. It deals with
unscheduled information demanding immediate publication. The reporter himself is
an eyewitness to the event that took place.
 Coverage news – News written from a given beat. Both spot news and coverage
news are good examples of first-hand reporting.
 Follow-up news – A sequel to a previous story. Having a new lead of its own, it is a
second, third or subsequent chapter of a serial.

3. Structure
 Straight News – News that consists of facts given straight without
embellishment. Its main aim is to inform. It uses the summary lead and is written
using the inverted pyramid structure.
 News-feature (Featurized news distinguished from a feature article) – It is also
based on facts, but it entertains more than it informs. It uses the suspended interest
structure like the narrative; thus, it cannot meet the cut-off test. In writing a news-
feature, the writer may give his impression, may describe and narrate, but without
resorting to biased opinion; i.e., without editorializing. The reporter‟s by-line usually
appears with his story.

(1) Single-feature or one-incident story – The story deals with an isolated

(2) Several-feature, multiple-angled, or composite story – Several facts are

4. Treatment
a. Fact story – This is a plain exposition setting forth a single situation or a series of
closely related facts that inform. It is written in the inverted pyramid design.
b. Action story – A narrative of actions involving not mere simple facts but also of
dramatic events, description of persons and events, perhaps testimony of
witnesses, as well as explanatory data. Sports games, competitions, accidents,
and war reports are examples of action stories.
c. Speech report – A news story usually written from a public address, talks, and
speeches.
d. Quote story – Speeches, statements, and letters, and to some extent, interviews
when reported, are regarded as quote stories. All are based on recorded
information, either written or spoken, and transcribed by the reporter in the form
of news.
e. Interview story – A news report written from an interview.
f. Hard news– events, such as killings, city council meetings and speeches by leading
government officials, are timely and are reported almost automatically by the
media.
g. Soft news – events, such as a lunch to honor a retiring school custodian or a boy
scouting jamboree are not usually considered immediately important or timely to
a wide audience.
5. Content
a. Routine story – celebrations, enrollment, graduation, election stories reported year in
and year out.
b. Police reports – accident, fire, calamity, crime stories, etc.
c. Science news
d. Developmental news
 e. Sports stories

6. Minor forms
a. News brief – A short item of news interest, written like a brief telegraphic message,
giving mainly the result with details.
b. News bulletin – It is similar to the lead of a straight news story. Its aim is just to give
the gist of the news.
c. News-featurette – This is a short news feature usually used as filler, e.g., “Quirks in
the news.”
d. Flash – A bulletin that conveys the first word of an event.