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By Rosella Eleanor LaFevre

My first attempt at making a magazine was in sixth grade. My friend and I wrote articles and compiled visuals that we glued to sheets of Xerox paper.

One Sunday I sat at my family’s copier and manually assembled ten double-sided copies of my 30+ page magazine, called RoZgIrl, that I passed out to my classmates the next day at school. I got a rush sharing my work with other people.

Then, as a sophomore in journalism school, I decided to start my own magazine for real. I’d watched magazines succeed and fall apart in my various internships and decided I could do this for real.

M.L.T.S. Magazine, a quarterly online publication that covers lifestyle, education and career topics for young women in college, was launched in June 2011.

It’s been the greatest challenge of my life and the rewards are addictive (being profiled on the Huffington Post was the coolest honor!). Among the many things I’ve learned from starting my own magazine are a few that have informed my interaction with editors at other magazines.

1. Editors are always looking for new writers.

Honestly, I get a little giddy every time a new writer contacts me saying they want to write for M.L.T.S. When I set out to create a magazine, I knew that I couldn’t write all of the articles, gather all the artwork, do the layout and promote the publication and so I did a big recruiting push – contacting j-school listservs and Ed2010 – and I got a lot of nibbles but very few writers stuck around.

Writers are a crucial part of the team and yet no matter how many writers I have, I’m always looking for new ones. I’ve had several writers back out at the last minute so I prefer having lots of writers on tap.

The takeaway: Even if you think there’s no way in heck that you’ll get a response, send that pitch or LOI!

2. Editors love controversy and shock-factor.

When I made that first magazine in sixth grade, I wrote a piece for the FOB fashion section about a classmate who anointed herself chief of the fashion police and made declarative statements about what the girls wore to school. I never used her name but my classmates knew who I meant. As my peers all turned to the same page and I heard whispers, I realized how important controversy can be for getting people interested in your magazine.

After starting M.L.T.S. my focus shifted toward page views and Facebook likes and my boyfriend kept saying, “Publish controversial stuff. Pick an unpopular view and write about it. Get people to notice you.” And he’s right. I need to publish stuff that will get people reading, responding and sharing if I want people to notice my magazine.

The takeaway: Writers might have an easier time breaking into a market if they pitch stories that are controversial or have great shock factor.

3. Editors sometimes need to be reminded that you sent that awesome pitch.

I get a lot of emails on my Android phone and sometimes, I just don’t feel like typing up a long response on its little screen or I want to read your resume and sample clips on my big computer… Then I forget to do those things when I’m next in front of a computer. Lots of times, it takes me a week to get back to writers.

Every now and then, a writer who has emailed me once will

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Could there be anything more thrilling (for a reader-rocker) than reading the beautifully researched, impeccably written David Remnick profile of Bruce Springsteen in the July 30 issue of The New Yorker?  The story is called "We Are Alive," and most everyone read it before I did, because my issue didn't arrive until late yesterday afternoon.  I'd read pieces online.  I'd read the raves.  But yesterday, after a very long day of corporate work and minor agitations, I found a breeze and read the profile through.  I didn't have to fall in love again with Bruce Springsteen; I've been in love since I was a kid.  But I loved, loved, loved every word of this story.  I would like to frame it.

(For those who haven't seen my Devon Horse Show photos and video of Jessica Springsteen, who is as sensational in her way as Bruce is, I share them here.)

Perhaps my favorite part of Remnick's article was discovering the way that Springsteen reads, how he thinks about books.  You don't get to be sixty-two and still magnetic, necessary, pulsingly, yes, alive if you don't know something, and if you don't commit yourself to endless learning.  Reading is one of the many ways Springsteen stays so connected to us, and so relevant.  From The New Yorker:

Lately, he has been consumed with Russian fiction.  "It's compensatory—what you missed the first time around," he said.  "I'm sixty-some, and I think, There are a lot of these Russian guys!  What's all the fuss about?  So I was just curious.  That was an incredible book: 'The Brothers Karamazov.' Then I read 'The Gambler.'  The social play in the first half was less interesting to me, but the second half, about obsession, was fun.  That could speak to me. I was a big John Cheever fan, and so when I got into Chekhov I could see where Cheever was coming from.  And I was a big Philip Roth fan, so I got into Saul Bellow, 'Augie March.' These are all new connections for me.  It'd be like finding out now that the Stones covered Chuck Berry."

Next week, I'll begin to write my paper for Glory Days: The Bruce Springsteen Symposium, which is being held in mid-September at Monmouth University, and where I'll be joining April Lindner, Ann Michael, Jane Satterfield, and Ned Balbo on a panel called "Sitting Round Here Trying to Write This Book: Bruce Springsteen and Literary Inspiration." I don't know if I've ever been so intimidated, or (at the same time) excited.  I don't know what I have in me, if I can write smart and well enough.

But this morning I take my energy, my inspiration, from the friends and good souls who have written over the past few days to tell me about their experience with Small Damages.  We writers write a long time, and sometimes our work resonates, and when it does, we are so grateful.  When others reach out to us, we don't know what to say.  We hope that thank you is enough.  And so, this morning, thank you, Alyson Hagy and Robb Forman Dew.  Thank you, Tamara Smith.  Thank you, Elizabeth Ator and Katherine Wilson.  Thank you, Jessica Ferro.  Thank you, Hilary Hanes.  And thank you, Miss Rosella Eleanor LaFevre, who interviewed me a few years ago about Dangerous Neighbors, and who has stayed in touch ever since.  I don't even know how to say thank you for 3 Comments on Bruce Springsteen, Glory Days Symposium, and Thanks, last added: 7/30/2012