unt.

=3. Writing the Human Interest Story.=--It is one thing to be able to
distinguish material for a human interest story and another to be able
to write the story. The whole effectiveness of the story, as we have
seen, depends upon the way it is written. Many a poorly written,
ungrammatical news story is printed simply because it contains facts
that are of interest, regardless of the way in which they are presented.
But never is a poorly written human interest story printed; simply
because the facts in it have little interest themselves and the story's
usefulness depends entirely upon the presentation of the facts. Hence,
the human interest story, more than any other newspaper story, must be
well written. And yet there are no rules to assist in the writing of
such a story. In fact, its very nature depends upon originality and
newness in form and treatment.

In the first place, we cannot fall back upon the conventional lead for a
beginning, because a lead would be out of place. As we have said before,
the human interest story does not begin with a lead for the reason that
it has no striking news content to present in the lead. In many cases
the whole story depends upon cleverly arranged suspense; if the content
is given in a lead at the beginning suspense is of course impossible.
The human interest story has no more need of a lead than does a short
story--in some ways a human interest story is very much like a short
story--and a short story that gives its climax in the first paragraph
would hardly be written or read. But, just like the short story, a human
interest story must begin in an attractive way. In the study of short
story writing almost half of the study is devoted to learning how to
begin the story, on the theory that the reader is some sort of a
fugitive animal that must be lassoed by an attractive and interesting
beginning. The theory is of course a true one and it holds good in the
case of human interest stories.

But no rules can be laid down to govern the beginning of human interest
or short stories. Each story must begin in its own way--and each must
begin in a different way. Some writers of short stories begin with
dialogue, others with a clean-cut witticism, others with attractive
explanation or description, others with a clever apology. The list is
endless. This endless list is ready for the reporter who is trying to
write human interest stories. But the choosing must be his own. He must
select