Jill Abramson: 'I Don't Want Every Story to be 1,800 Words'

In an upcoming interview with C-SPAN, Jill Abramson, the Executive Editor of the New York Times, said that one thing she will change during her time at the paper is story length.

“I don’t want every story to be 1,800 words,” said Abramson. “I think in general, we have a lot of long stories that need to be long, things like Amy Harmon’s profile of a young adult with autism, which you know was very very long, but worth every word. There is a certain lack of discipline sometimes. A point is repeated too many times in a story or there are three quotes making the same point where one would do and I’d like to see a variety of story lines.”

Shortened stories seem to be a trend at newspapers. As we mentioned early last week, the Wall Street Journal’s long form pieces have declined tremendously over the past few years, and that has been a good thing for the paper. We’re sure some will overreact to Abramson wanting to shorten the Times’ pieces, but she’s a smart woman, we doubt her dedication to brevity will lead to all short, all the time.

The rest of the interview will air on Sunday at 8:00 pm.