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Topic: How to Write a Q&A..verbartim???
| Author | Message |
| charityanais | Posted – 8/26/2008 2:55:53 PM | show profile | email poster I have been assigned a Q and A piece and after doing the interview am beginning to realize that I have no idea how to put it into Q and A format and upon reviewing other Q and A pieces, interviewees never answer so succinctly. So we're not dealing with exact quotes here, right? Help! |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 8/26/2008 3:37:11 PM | show profile It would be impossible to do a verbatim q-and-a without making the subject look stupid and boring the reader. People will debate how much you can change, though. Probably no one would disagree with removing the "ers" and mangled sentences. I've never done a q-and-a that was a transcription. I always have to tighten material, rewrite some, make up bridging material, and move stuff around. The key to me is to preserve the subject's voice and thoughts. |
| jcpatterson | Posted – 8/26/2008 3:39:36 PM | show profile Charity: You aren't talking "legal deposition" exact quotes, with all of the "ums," "ers," and circuitous diversions from the topic. But you aren't talking about your paraphrase of the answer, either. When I do a Q&A, I'm careful to either tape or do the interview by email or both, so that I have access to exact quotes. Then, I edit the quotes in order to keep the sentences that are direct answers to the questions only. I may clear things up by putting something in brackets, or join two ideas with an ellipsis, but I am careful to keep the interview pretty much as is. For example: Q: What do you think about the color blue? Well, um, I kind of like blue, it isn't really a grassy color like green, but I guess it kind of reminds me of skies and beaches. Q: How about red? Not really crazy about using red in my art. Just too inflamatory and exciting a color. This becomes: Q: What do you think about blue? How about red? A: I kind of like blue....it kind of reminds me of skies and beaches. [I'm] not that crazy about using red in my art, [because it is] just too inflamatory and exciting a color. That is, I might put two questions together for clarity and space, but I don't use an answer from a later question to answer a current one, and I am careful not to use sentence fragments, even in order, to create a new sentence out of context for the interviewee. A lot of what makes for a successful Q&A is a function of being very well organized during the interview. The writing kind of takes care of itself. |
| chucho | Posted – 8/26/2008 4:18:34 PM | show profile I think it's understood that you should edit for length and finding the newsworthy parts. Just don't alter what the person said and be careful about cobbling sections together. I'd stick to "chunks" of commentary, not cobbling sentences together here and there and use ellipses if you need to (but not too many). |
| chucho | Posted – 8/26/2008 4:19:19 PM | show profile PS: This usually involved transcribing the whole thing first, which is the crappiest part of doing a Q&A. |
| abqwriter | Posted – 8/26/2008 4:47:37 PM | show profile | email poster Let me preface this with saying that I hate the Q&A format as a writer but enjoy it as a reader. (Guess that's why they're popular.) Here are a few things I do that might help; take what you want and ignore the rest: I try to keep my interviews for Q&A's very casual, and I let the subject go on and on about a topic so that there is plenty of real quotes to harvest for the different questions. Since the "A" part is supposed to be quoted words, I don't ever paraphrase what they've said and try not to cut and splice comments. Even though Q&A's have a strict format when it comes to writing, I've found that when I let the interview get off formatted questions, I get a lot better material, so don't worry about just sticking to the questions you've created. If they go someplace else, give them some room to talk. You never know what nugget you'll find. Also, if you do have to cut and splice, make a courtesy call and verify the "new" quote. That way you don't get an angry call to an editor about mis-quotes and you'll have access to that person the next time to you need an interview. You screw up the quotes, and they'll do anything they can to avoid talking to you on the record in the future. Best wishes. |
