Anecdotes in News Stories

Hurray for readers’ representative Narda Zacchino for expressing my feelings for many years (Commentary, Nov. 21). The Times publishes far too many front-page articles beginning with anecdotes and not really providing a summation of the content. That reveals, in my view, poor writing and editing skills, when a simple synopsis (even of a complex topic) cannot be distilled into one paragraph.

In my business, for everything I write longer than a page, I must provide a summary or synopsis in the first paragraph. Sure, the Wall Street Journal does this, but only in certain columns. You know which kind of essay you are going to be reading by the position and format. The Times, its editors and reporters don’t seem to get it.

MICHAEL SCOFIELD

Anaheim

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Zacchino discussed readers’ vexation with anecdotal leads, which explains why I’m writing this letter anecdotally. There’s the story of the actor who, while out of town, gets a call from a friend. The friend says, “I have bad news. Your agent came to your house, attacked your wife, beat your kids and burned the place down.” The actor responds incredulously, “My agent came to my house?”

Zacchino writes of a Times’ reader who put on a fleece robe to ward off the chill, shuffled across the bare wooden floor, deactivated the alarm and “opened the door and grabbed his newspaper from the doorstep.” His newspaper was on the doorstep?

MICHAEL HIRSH

Valley Glen

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I too have wondered what happened to the news story as news story, as I would start to read a column and feel my heartstrings being tugged, before I even knew what I was supposed to react to. After reading Zacchino’s piece, I finally caught on: In fact, this new style is part of what is now praised and promoted in every aspect of media. It is the triumph of style over substance. It is not the story that is important, it is the effect to be created out of its raw material. Facts are not facts, and the writer is not at their service; they are at his/hers, to play with at will.

How sad for those of us who remember the days when there was a difference between news and entertainment.

ELAINE SMITHAM

Los Angeles