But Wait- There's More!!

One thing I decided that I absolutely had to do while I am in England was to buy the British version of a magazine. When I got to the magazine section of the store I was in, my thought was immediately: "What is all of this stuff?" Because it seemed like every magazine I was interested in was packaged with not only the magazine itself, but a bunch of extra bonus stuff. Cosmopolitan comes with a sample size of shampoo and conditioner from Herbal Essences. I decided to go with with Elle, not only because it featured Emma Watson, who I want to be, but because it came with a shirt. A shirt. What American magazines come with that much stuff? None that I have ever seen.

From a journalistic perspective, I was interested to see how different articles would be in British magazines versus American ones. Other than little things ("favourite" instead of "favorite," and phrases like "Where will you be going on holiday this summer?"), the style for magazine article was very much the same.

Take that story on Emma Watson, for example. Now I have read more Cosmo than I would ever care to own up to, and by now I have a pretty good idea of the formula in stories like these. Exhibit A:

Formula: Story always starts with the author telling about the setting he/she is in when about to interview the star.

Elle Story: "I arrive at Leavesdon Studios near Watford in Hertfordshire at 11:30 on a Tuesday morning."

Formula: Something slightly dramatic about star's entrance.

Elle Story: "I'm sitting in the canteen when, suddenly, she's there, hovering over me and grinning shyly."

Formula: Description of what star is wearing/looks like.

Elle Story: "In the flesh, she's aristocratically beautiful. Willowy thin with perfect, youthful skin naturally flushed, and those to-die-for strong, slanted eyebrows. Her youth is emphasized by her clothes; fresh from a morning of filming, she's head-to-toe in Hermione-wear..."

I could go on, but you get the idea. It was amusing to me how on the other side of the globe, magazine articles are stylistically identical to American ones. It's a little comforting piece of home, but I expected something...grander. More eloquent maybe? Nonetheless, I have my British magazine, and even though I expected something decidedly more uniquely British, it is still far cooler than any of my friends' American Cosmo mags any day.