A news release from the public relations office of the University of Arkansas, the “University Relations,” recently announced that noted writer Ellen Gilchrist, of the UA Creative Writing and Translation Program, had an essay published in last November’s Smithsonian Magazine, “Watching Water Run: My Kind of Town.”
The essay is vivid; she explains why she lives in Fayetteville. It made me proud of my town. It made me proud of the hoops I jumped to take a class she taught in spring 2003. It made me proud of hearing her — and never forgetting — in the first years of NPR’s Morning Edition in the early 1980s, where she read from her journal, or so she claimed (the drafts may have started in a diary but these were burnished to flow and, importantly, to sound right for radio). I was proud she was run in a big magazine, though Ellen has long been in top publications.
Then this past week, the Winter 2007 edition of the Fulbright Review, a newsletter for the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, arrived in the mail. It’s produced by U’ Relations. It prominently reprints Ellen’s essay! Wait: Something’s missing. A good deal. All but three paragraphs. There is a sidebar though, a novel excerpt, which in the original was its concluding section.
The original is not at all long. It prints out to a page and a half. But it paints photographic miniatures of local characters, along with the flavor of what you often see here, daily. Yet the UA editor chose three mere transition paragraphs that move the piece from the opening of a typical week in Ellen’s life, to where she shrinks decades to a glance out her window. A UA alumna I love read the butchered piece then asked me, What is the big deal about Ellen Gilchrist? Hit the link above, sweetheart.
To prove my point I would link to the Fulbright Review. I didn’t want to criticize them in the first place, but merely post two links so you could see for yourself. Alas, its Web site last was updated to — the Spring 2006 issue. (A private magazine would post archival material to encourage you to buy the current print edition. This is a sales brochure, man, they want you to enroll your kid or donate a few thou). All right, see for yourself.
Being a serious home cook, at restaurants I love to try new things then guess the intricacies of preparation (the menu only says grilled) and figure out what else is in them (which spices, butter or olive oil, fresh garlic or jarred).
Editing is my trade so I should be able to guess why Ellen’s evocative essay got chopped. I spot two. (1) Avoid even the slightest chance of controversy. If your job is to please everyone, cut out passing mentions of world and campus politics as well as those colorful friends and neighbors. They’re unnamed and Ellen paints them glowingly, but what if anyone took anything the wrong way?
The other reason is graphic design. I cook to eat well and edit to afford food, but I am a writer. A writer sees the sole purpose of typography, illustration and layout as serving words. To recruit students and draw donations, marketing theory may well indicate that content must be sacrificed for form, words for fads in page design.
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