The repeated failures of the unprepared have given rise to the rumor
that only the scripts of favored writers are read in editorial
offices. The old trick of placing small pieces of paper between the
sheets, in order to prove whether or not the script was read through,
is as popular today as it was twenty years ago with story writers. The
gentleman who has the first reading of all the scripts received by a
certain company called the attention of one of the present authors to
just such a script only recently. What was the result? Some of the
minute pieces of paper fell out the moment the script was taken from
the envelope for examination. That was enough. The script was almost
immediately placed in another envelope and returned to the
writer--with a rejection slip. Unfair treatment of the writer? Not at
all! Following the discovery of the concealed particles of paper, a
glance at the first page was sufficient to convince the editor that it
was the work of another amateur who was foolish enough to add to a
miserably prepared script the proof that he doubted the honesty of the
editor to whom he had addressed his offering.
It is only reasonable to believe that every editor will read at least
so much of every script as is necessary to convince him of its value
or its lack of value to the firm by which he is employed.
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