Magazine Writing

What does it take to launch a career writing for magazines?

In this comprehensive, up-to-date introduction to magazine writing, students will learn everything from the initial story pitch all the way through to the final production, taking with them the essential tools and skills they will need for today’s rapidly changing media landscape.

Written by a team of experienced writers and editors, Magazine Writing teaches the time-tested rules for good writing alongside the modern tools for digital storytelling. From service pieces to profiles, entertainment stories and travel articles, it provides expert guidance on topics such as:

• developing saleable ideas;
• appealing to specific segments of the market;
• navigating a successful pitch;
• writing and editing content for a variety of areas, including service, profiles, entertainment, travel, human interest and enterprise

Chock full of examples of published works, conversations with successful magazine contributors and bloggers, and interviews with working editors, Magazine Writing gives students all the practical and necessary insights they need to jumpstart a successful magazine writing career.

Christopher D. Benson is Associate Professor of Journalism and African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has written for Chicago, Savoy, Jet, and The Crisis magazines, and has contributed to The Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times and Reader’s Digest. He has worked as Features Editor and Washington Editor for Ebony magazine.

Charles F. Whitaker is Helen Gurley Brown Magazine Research Chair at the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University. He was a senior editor at Ebony magazine and a reporter at the Miami Herald and the Louisville Times (Ky.), and he has written for the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, Chicago magazine, Jet magazine, Essence magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Saturday Evening Post, Chicago Parent magazine, and Folio.