What's in a Word?

At the moment we're putting the January Travel supplement "to subs" - this is a busy time... Made more hectic by the fact that writers we had commissioned to review for our Guide haven't submitted their copy yet (that is, they haven't sent in their stories...). This has left my editor and I to do the write-ups for hotels and resorts we haven't even been to, when we're already inundated with the zillion other tasks required in order to get the issue to the printers on time. The only saving grace? I'm getting paid 100 pounds a piece for each review I write. Secretly, I want the writers to fail - it means I can splurge on a can of tuna in springwater, instead of in brine... Yummy!

Being part of the process though is the best part. Seeing how my editor turns crap copy into something half-way readable, and how she cuts 400 words down to the required 175 is fantastic. At university I always had trouble keeping within the required word-limit, but with the amount I have been writing at BAZAAR, I have become quite adept at cutting to the chase. Or so I think...

Watching three different editors (from three different sections of the mag - travel, features and entertainment) debate over some Guide entries today highlighted just how subjective the whole writing-thing is. As each read over my editor's shoulder, Entertainment exclaimed, "Oh, I hate when 'they' describe lush gardens..," while Features responded, "But I like lush gardens, I know exactly what 'they' mean," as my editor wiped the screen of the "lush gardens" and edited the sentence to focus on the 19th century marble sculptures to be seen from the bay windows in the hotel's lobby - that overlooked the bay in Cornwall.

Each woman is in charge of her section of the magazine - and each would have written the piece with an entirely different focus. Call it an angle, call it style, call it what you will... all I know is that I then spent a good ten minutes going through my reviews to assure myself that I hadn't sprouted anything "lush" or worse still, found anything "nestled" in the "heart" of any towns. When you're dealing with such a restricted word limit, cutting a sentence in half can make or break an article, and using the wrong word can definitely ruin your mag-cred.

Then there's working to deadline. Spending yet another day in the office until after sundown I began to question, and begrudge - ever so slightly - the freelance writers. Because no matter how crap their copy, they had visited the resorts, enjoyed their free dinners and spa treatments, and had been paid for a review that would have taken less than an hour to write. And now, their copy was being transformed, being manipulated and cajoled into something worthy of the printers. And it was their name, not my editor's, that was going to be gracing the glossy pages.

But who enjoys the greater glory?