New yorker cartoon caption contest9/10/2023 That's the sort of thinking that appeals to people who don't really write but want to assume that success in that field is some sort of popularity test, not a long-term effort that involves constant effort to improve your work. You'd expect a parent to express such optimism at PTA meetings, but I think the real point to the brief flurry of attention the kid got was to reinforce the fallacy that the competition was really very easy and losing was only a matter of unfair conditions. The implication was that if she were able to enter her ideas, she'd be winning every week. Last year there were quite a few articles about a nine-year-old girl who wrote captions for the contest but was too young to officially submit them. You think the prize is within your grasp, but the challenge isn't really what you perceive it to be. Who needs the added aggravation?Ĭontests like that can be as maddening as playing some carnival game where it seems easy to win a stuffed animal by throwing rings around milk bottles or whatever. Only continue if you're having fun with it, and the moment you're not then stop.Īnd then stop reading the caption contest. There's no agent who is going to take you on. There's no job with the New Yorker or SNL. Better to focus my talents on something else.Īnd that would be my advice to anyone frustrated over not winning. In this case, it wasn't worth it to keep submitting. So what did we do? Instead of getting mad, and challenging their selection process, we simply stopped submitting. And often I thought the one my comedy writer pal submitted was better than mine.īut like I said, we never broke through. Sometimes I thought the one they picked was terrific. Did I think mine were better than those selected? Most of the time. I trust this person's opinion of comedy way more than some assistant editor's. We would run our captions by each other to make sure they were good enough. In the case of the caption contest, a very prominent comedy writer and I used to submit. And I file the rejections and forget about it. It's worth it to me to keep submitting, and along the way I do get some acceptances, so I continue. Plays that won major festivals get rejected by minor festivals. I find this when entering ten-minute plays in festivals. You may write the most brilliant caption ever and it gets lost, or the reader didn't get it, or didn't read it right, or was in a bad mood, or has a different sensibility, or seventeen other reasons. How many talented people became successful sitcom writers when they watched the crap on TV and said, "I could do better that this!"?īut 5,000 to 1 are staggering odds. I've got news for you: in 90% of cases, you're wrong.īut that attitude is still a great motivator. Obviously, you're going to think that your entry was better. Can you really take it personally when yours isn't selected? I mean, seriously? 5,000 people apparently enter every week. Welcome to the world of comedy rejection.Ĭomedy is soooo subjective. When a colleague was a finalist but didn't win there was a lot of bitterness believing his caption was better than the winner's. I don't even think there's a prize other than bragging rights.Īn article in KQED Arts takes issue with the selections the magazine makes. Three finalists are selected, people vote, and then the winner is announced. They feature a cartoon and readers are invited to submit funny captions. The New Yorker magazine has a weekly feature: the cartoon caption contest.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |