The Inverted Pyramid And The E
Newswriting, as it exists today, began with the adoption of the telegraph, which roughly coincided with the start of the American Civil War. The necessity of getting at story through before the telegraph’s occasional malfunction forced a radical change in the style of writing used in reporting. Before the telegraph, much of writing news was just that: writing. News was reported much like books were written. The reporter would set the scene with a detailed account of the setting or the mood and tell the tale just like any other narrative that one might read simply for pleasure. Since the telegraph made it possible for news to be printed the day after it happened; it was immediately adopted ...
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system, born of necessity, was absorbed into newswriting over the proceeding century, and exists today as the standard style for reporting news. At the beginning of the civil war, the protracted narrative style still predominated the newswriting of the period. For the most part, stories were verbose almost to the point of obsequy and read more like an intellectual discourse on the topic, rather than a report of news. In a story on the front page of the Times of April 11, 1861, the reporter, who is begins his story, “Every good citizen must rejoice that the new administration manifests a disposition to guard more faithfully its State secrets than did its predecessors. The promulgation of the purposes of the Government while those are not yet entirely formed, or when disclosure would tend to defeat or embarrass them, is quite as weak as it is undignified. But this reticence may be carried to far, and lead to more mischief than it is designed to prevent.” It is important to note that ...
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exists, but does not yet dominate the news hole, as news stories written in this manner are still the exception. Also on the front page of the same issue of the Times is a story bearing the headline “A Clue to the Destination of One of the Ships” . This story’s lead also does not follow the who-what-when-where-why format that is a necessary part of the inverted pyramid model. The lead is as follows: “At the Troy arsenal unusual bustle has been observable within the past week.” Had the story that followed this lead been about the “bustle” that had been observed at the Troy arsenal, then this would be a good lead suitable for a modern news story, however, the reporter goes on to tell of ...
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"The Inverted Pyramid And The E." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 14 Mar. 2004. Web. 19 Apr. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Inverted-Pyramid-And-The-E/4551>
"The Inverted Pyramid And The E." Essayworld.com. March 14, 2004. Accessed April 19, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Inverted-Pyramid-And-The-E/4551.
"The Inverted Pyramid And The E." Essayworld.com. March 14, 2004. Accessed April 19, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Inverted-Pyramid-And-The-E/4551.
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