To be published

It is such an endlessly tiring task to send pitches to editors. And such a thankless one. I’m sure most freelancers start out in similar situations, but freelance writers must be the most ignored of all workers.

Few publications even think it worthwhile to pay for writing, and many offer pennies. It’s enraging to see the list of qualifications required by almost everyone in the writing gigs category on craigslist.org – rockstar writer, knowledge of several different style sheets, experience and published samples – and then, more often than not, all they offer is ‘A byline and the chance to be part of a growing magazine’.

And with pitches, one in fifty editors cares to respond even to decline the article. And the ones that do write back, mostly do so to reject your idea or worse, accept it but without payment. Because the darned print industry has no budget to commission freelancers anymore.

So it’s even more frustrating when you do give in once in a while and accept the offer of byline-without-pay, and send in all the writing and photos and bios and head shots before deadline, only to never hear back from the editor again. Not even if it’s just to find out whether or not the story has been published after all.

In an attempt to be published outside Indian newspapers, I wrote to a large South African conglomerate that had earlier rejected one of my pitches saying that though the story I proposed was good, they did not offer any payment. I asked if they would be interested in republishing one of my travel stories, Eatopia in Vietnam, which the Asian Age printed in July this year. The travel editor, Omneshnie Naidoo, wrote back promptly to say they would and requested photos etc. Sure, sent it all in, and asked when the story would likely be published.

Nay say. Never heard back from her. So for all I know, she took my story and published it with her own byline! Unfortunately, the website of The Mercury, the newspaper she works with, has a lousy website, and as far as I can see, hasn’t published my story online. But I would really like to see the story in print. Considering I’m not in Kwazulu-Natal, where the paper is published, I don’t know how to go about getting any information from Naidoo and co.