The strengths of writing a summary lead are that it is short and too the point, and extremely effective when writing breaking news stories in which the reader must learn what happened within the first few lines of the story. The downside to this type of lead is that it lacks an artistic spin, or an ability to tell a story in a more creative way. A good example of a summary lead appeared in the Boston Globe this Saturday entitled "Report of a gunman inside MIT unfounded, authorities say". This article was overall pretty short and to the point, but one could get the gist of the article within the first two sentences. Within those first two, we already understand why it’s news.
The delayed lead allows for more creativity in the telling of the story, but can lose a reader when the point of the article does not come until later. In order to avoid this, the article must grab the attention of the reader not by telling the synopsis of the story, but rather using emotion and other tactics that evoke a response.
No comments:
Post a Comment