1. Short thread on how a writer failed to file his @TheAtlantic story by the assigned deadline, and we all ended up with “Mutiny on the Bounty."
@TheAtlantic 2. In 1916, @TheAtlantic sent a young James Norman Hall across, well, the Atlantic to write a story on the brave American volunteers flying for France. But Hall was swept up in the romance of it all, and decided to join the Lafayette Escadrille himself.
@TheAtlantic 3. Hall proved an exceptional aviator; he won the Médaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre with five palms. Writers, it turns out, will do almost anything to avoid a deadline—even take to the sky and fight a world war. Meanwhile, his @TheAtlantic editors were forced to wait.
@TheAtlantic 4. Hall’s exploits were serialized in @TheAtlantic as “High Aventure." That literary success won him an assignment, with Charles Nordhoff, to write a history of the Lafayette Flying Corps. theatlantic.com/newsletters/ar…
@TheAtlantic 5. The two men moved to Tahiti, where both wrote regulary for @TheAtlantic. And in 1932, the Atlantic Monthly Press brought out “Mutiny on the Bounty,” the first volume of their trilogy, based on the real-life story.
@TheAtlantic 6. The moral of this story, obviously, is that writers should always file by their assigned deadlines. (But if you’re going to miss your deadline, a chestful of medals is an acceptable excuse.)
