This week I decided to give the Independent a read and find out more on the style of their travel articles. I read the ‘Helsinki City Guide’ written by Hazel Sheffield. From this article I have decided the Independent is not a publication I would go to for travel journalism. However it’s been useful in helping me identify what type of writer I want to be and the kind of publication I want to write for.
The ironic thing is that the article got off to a great start. Sheffield uses lots of persuasive language in the stand first to help sell the idea of Helsinki from the offset. You need an exciting and persuasive stand first to encourage readers to go on and read a lengthy article. If you can’t keep their attention with the first couple of sentences how are you expected to when you get into the boring stuff such as what there is to do. This is something Sheffield was successful with, she sold the idea of Helsinki to me by implying there was something for everyone. I was interested to see all the many things Helsinki has to offer.
However unfortunately for Sheffield, there was a huge declined from there. The article then goes into a basic layout, paragraphs that are seperated with the usual subheadings i.e. what to do, where to stay, where to drink etc. Some may say this makes the article clear and easy to read. Personally I found this took the excitement away from a travel piece. I personally want to be taken on a journey and the sub headings took all sense of adventure away. Along with this, I felt that a lot of readers will have just skipped to the bits they are interested in. For example, if someone is thinking about going somewhere for cheap drinks, the reader will skip straight to the nightlife section and not even bother to read the rest of the article.
Despite the basic layout I read on and found the article does in fact have a lot of positives. I loved the imbedded links so people could be taken to the website of the hotel for example Sheffield discusses. It is something so simple but so effective, if readers are actually sold on the idea of Helsinki, by clicking the link they can be taken to accommodation from the article itself.
Moreover I felt the use of facts and figures when discussing elements of Helsinki was a really strong factor of the article. The feature is called ‘A city guide’ so being given facts on Helsinki made you feel as if you were actually there and a tourist guide was feeding you the information. All the facts were relevant and useful such as the prices of activities and hotels and how far away Helsinki is in relation to these.
There were a few occasions I struggled to keep myself interested in the article. I think this was down to the way the article has been written. It has a really detatched tone to it. A prime example of this is when Sheffield discusses the architecture in Helsinki. She uses semi colons to break up a really long sentence that lists off all the things you can see. In a way there was a sense of excitement about this sentence as its as if the writer is really excited and just listing off the many things you can see before they forget. On the other hand it felt like she had simply done her research and found all the popular places as opposed to having visiting them herself and recommending them for particular reasons. I was unable to relate to her and connect with her writing as there were no personal views or feelings given about anything she was writing.
Having said that the article boasted a plethora of descriptive language. Much of what Sheffield discussed would be describe using really glamorous word such as thriving and sparkling which allowed me to imagine what Helsinki would be like. I’m really fond of sensual words like those because it engages all yours senses and allows you to create a picture in your head.
The article ends with a sub heading of ‘nuts and bolts’ which displays 4/5 questions with one sentence answers, for example ‘what is the currency’. I thought this was a clever way to end. It’s easy to read which is ideally what you want after a reasonably lengthy article and rounds up all the loose ends readers may have been wondering about.
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