“The business of an editor, as Goddard understood it, came down to two fundamentals: “to seize attention and deliver a compelling message.†The first took priority because it allowed for the second. Goddard believed that the way to seize attention was to print stories of interest to readers. Too many editors, he felt, filled their papers with items they themselves found interesting, or that interested their peers or people in positions of authority. authority. Others sought to impress their audiences with their own superior taste, judgment, or intellect—they were especially fond of stories they believed readers ought to appreciate. Goddard dismissed these approaches as impractical, self-indulgent, and condescending to readers. Goddard’s more daring assertions begin from the premise that it is hard to make people think. He agrees that the power of abstract thought is the highest human faculty, but he nonetheless sees a lot of flattery in the notion that man is a rational animal. In Goddard’s observation, people are far more interested in their sense perceptions and emotions than in their thoughts. He sees nothing particularly wrong or shameful in this, but puts it down to the fact that we have been sensing, feeling, and emoting since we lived in caves, while we have only lately begun to cultivate our rational faculties, public education and mass literacy being last-minute innovations in the life of man. Thus, while all mankind is capable of rational thought, most of us only use it with deliberate effort, after a good night’s sleep, and for remuneration. Even then, our efforts are often halfhearted and the results mixed. Our senses and emotions, by contrast, are always engaged and rather quickly and effortlessly excited and acted upon. At any given moment, our feelings are far more likely to be governing our intellects than vice versa. If an editor, then, wants to set our minds aglow, he had better respect our natural human inheritance and approach us through the grand portal of feelings rather than through the sticky wicket of rational thought. The appeal to feelings is not an end in itself. Goddard argues that our emotions tend to ignite our intellects: a story catering to a reader’s feelings is more likely than a dry treatise to stimulate thought and persuade a reader to begin weighing facts and arguments. Great storytellers, he observes, have relied upon this approach from the Bible through Shakespeare to Dickens—aren’t those works celebrated for stimulating and cultivating human feelings as well as intellects? He was careful to note that recognizing the importance of the emotions was not an argument for vulgarity, lewdness, or appeals to base passions. He further insisted that the point of seizing a reader’s attention was to deliver a message, preferably something bold and compelling. He did not waste much space on the nature of the message to be delivered; an editor without something to say, in Goddard’s Goddard’s estimation, was beyond help. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 333). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 333). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 333). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 333). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (pp. 332-333). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 332). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 331). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. Whyte, Kenneth. The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst (p. 331). Counterpoint Press. Kindle Edition. ”
