The new Sunday magazine of the newspaper bids fair to be a crisp, sensible review and critique of the live world.  It has developed a special line of writers who have learned that a character sketch and interview of a man makes you “see” the man face to face and talk with him yourself.  If he has done anything that gives him a place in the news of to-day, he is presented to you.  You know the man.

It seems to me that the leading feature of the Sunday magazine should be the biggest topic that will be before the public on the Sunday that the newspaper is printed.  It should be written by one who thoroughly knows his subject, who is forceful in style and fluent in words, who can make a picture that his readers can see, and seeing, realize.  So every other feature of the Sunday magazine should have points of human interest, either by contact with the news of the day or with men and women who are doing something besides getting divorces and creating scandals.

I firmly believe that the coming Sunday magazine will contain articles of information without being dull or encyclopaedic, articles of adventure that are real and timely, articles of scientific discoveries that are authentic, interviews with men and women who have messages, and interpretations of news and analyses of every-day themes, together with sketches, poems, and essays that are not tedious, but have a reason for being printed.

THE MAGAZINE FIELD.  The great majority of magazines differ from all newspapers in one important respect—­extent of circulation.  Popular magazines have a nation-wide distribution.  It is only among agricultural and trade journals that we find a distinctly sectional circulation.  Some of these publications serve subscribers in only one state or section, and others issue separate state or sectional editions.  The best basis of differentiation among magazines, then, is not the extent of circulation but the class of readers appealed to, regardless of the part of the country in which the readers live.  The popular general magazine, monthly or weekly, aims to attract readers of all classes in all parts of the United States.

HOW MAGAZINES GET MATERIAL.  Magazine articles come from (1) regular members of the magazine’s staff, (2) professional or amateur free-lance writers, (3) specialists who write as an avocation, and (4) readers of the periodical who send in material based on their own experience.

The so-called “staff system” of magazine editing, in accordance with which practically all the articles are prepared by writers regularly employed by the publication, has been adopted by a few general magazines and by a number of class periodicals.  The staff is recruited from writers and editors on newspapers and other magazines.  Its members often perform various editorial duties in addition to writing articles.  Publications edited in this way buy few if any articles from outsiders.