The Writers We Become: Martha Gellhorn, Caitlin Moran and a Young Woman Called Phoebe
Updated: 1 day ago
By Rebeca Riofrio
“I’m Phoebe. I’m so nervous.”
There she was, standing in front of me, a young woman who had just won one of the most promising new literary prizes in British journalism, looking rather as though she would have preferred to be anywhere else.
“Why are you nervous?” I asked.
“I’m not used to this,” she replied.
But who is?
I had arrived early at Bob Bob Ricard in Soho, having accepted a lovely invitation from the British Society of Magazine Editors (BSME) to celebrate the inaugural winner of its Young Writers' Prize, established in partnership with the formidable Caitlin Moran.
My intention was perfectly sensible. I would arrive before the other guests, find a quiet corner, read the winning article and prepare myself for the evening.
Instead, I found Phoebe Evans.
And within seconds, I was seventeen again.
At that age, newly arrived in Britain from Ecuador, I met the woman who would become my literary mentor, Martha Gellhorn. She was terrifying.
Gellhorn had witnessed wars, challenged powerful men, travelled through places most people only encountered in newspapers, and written about human suffering with a ferocity that left little room for sentimentality. She had no particular interest in making people comfortable. Least of all an inexperienced teenager who did not yet know whether she possessed the ability to write. I certainly did not know.
At seventeen, I had neither the confidence nor the vocabulary to imagine myself becoming a journalist. English was not my first language. I was still learning how to make my thoughts belong to a country that was not the one in which I had been born.
Martha could be formidable. Her exterior was hard, her opinions harder. But beneath that intimidating intelligence I discovered an extraordinary capacity for affection, encouragement and loyalty.
She taught me something I have never forgotten: a writer does not need someone constantly telling them how wonderful they are. A writer needs someone who believes there is something worth developing, and who cares enough to demand that they develop it properly.
Looking at Phoebe, I wondered whether what she needed at that particular moment was not another compliment about her achievement, but simply a little human kindness.
“Can I give you a hug?” I asked.
I told her that we were all human, that I was nervous too, and that she must be rather good if an entire room of professional editors and writers had gathered to celebrate her.
After all, writers are notoriously brutal judges of other people's writing. We can spend twenty minutes arguing over a single adjective and another hour explaining why someone else's opening paragraph does not work.
If this particular collection of literary critics had agreed that Phoebe deserved a celebratory dinner, she had every reason to feel proud. She smiled.
It was a small moment, but I suspect I shall remember it longer than the menu.
A Room Full of People Who Understand Words
As the guests began arriving, the small private dining room at Bob Bob Ricard gradually surrendered to the unmistakable sound of media people enjoying themselves.
There is something peculiar about putting a group of editors together. Everyone is accustomed to asking questions, offering opinions, interrupting politely and occasionally forgetting the polite part.
Within minutes, conversations were taking place in every corner of the room. The noise grew, the wine appeared, and the cold London evening outside made the warmth of our little gathering all the more agreeable.
Looking around the table, I could not help thinking of the apostles at the Last Supper, although in our considerably less solemn version we were all waiting for Caitlin Moran.
The comparison was irreverent, I know. But there was something rather amusing about watching some of Britain's most experienced editorial minds gather around a table in anticipation of one woman and one exceptionally talented young writer.
Among those present were Dan Green, BSME chair for 2026 and editor of The Week Junior Science+Nature; Cliff Joannou, editor-in-chief of Attitude and Rolling Stone UK; Kirsty McGregor, editorial director of Fortune Europe; and Laurence Mozafari, editorial director for youth audiences at Reach plc.
Also joining us were Tara Geoghegan of Haymarket Media Group; Esther Newman of Women's Running; Louise Robinson of Saga Magazine; Fiona Salmon of DoubleVerify; Alix Walker of Stylist; Maria Pieri of National Geographic Traveller (UK); Gideon Spanier of Campaign; Andrew Webb of Connectopia; and Marcus Webb of Delayed Gratification.
A formidable collection of editorial experience, although mercifully nobody appeared interested in behaving formidably.
This is one of the reasons I have grown so fond of the BSME community.
For more than four decades, the Society has brought together the people responsible for shaping British magazine journalism, across print and digital publishing. Its membership includes editors whose publications influence fashion, politics, business, culture, science and everyday life.
Yet what I particularly appreciate is its refusal to treat professional achievement as something that should be guarded jealously.
The best editorial communities understand that experience becomes more valuable when it is shared.
And that evening, experience had gathered to make room for youth.
Eight Hundred and Thirty-One Reasons to Believe in Young Writers
The inaugural BSME & Caitlin Moran Young Writers' Prize attracted 831 submissions from across Britain, from Aberdeen to Cornwall.
That number deserves a moment's consideration.
Eight hundred and thirty-one young people sat down and wrote something they hoped another person might want to read. Some undoubtedly did so with confidence. Others may have spent hours rewriting their opening sentences, questioning every paragraph, or wondering whether their work was worth submitting at all.
The competition was open to UK residents aged eighteen to twenty-five, regardless of their educational background or previous professional experience.
The invitation was refreshingly simple: write about something you love.
Not what an editor might consider fashionable. Not what an algorithm might reward. Something personal, particular and genuinely yours.
The judging panel, composed of experienced editors, narrowed the submissions to a shortlist before Moran selected the winner.
Phoebe Evans emerged with The Acorn Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree.
Her award includes £12,000, a year of personal mentoring with Caitlin Moran and professional work experience within the magazine industry.
The financial award is significant, particularly for someone at the beginning of a writing career. But the mentoring and professional access may prove equally consequential.
Talent is not distributed according to postcode, family income or the schools people attend. Opportunity, unfortunately, often is.
A young person may possess a remarkable literary voice and still have no idea whom to approach, where to submit their work, or how to survive financially while developing their craft.
There are practical reasons why so many aspiring writers eventually abandon the profession.
Writing is difficult. Getting published is harder. Earning a reliable living from it can be harder still.
We live in a culture increasingly impatient for immediate results. Young people are encouraged to acquire marketable skills, build businesses, monetise their interests and demonstrate measurable success.
Writing offers few guarantees of any of these things.
A person can spend months producing something that earns almost nothing, attracts little attention and is rejected without explanation.
And yet society depends upon people continuing to write.
Without writers, who will record what governments would prefer forgotten? Who will question convenient versions of history? Who will describe lives that rarely appear in official accounts?
Who will make us laugh at our own absurdities, or recognise ourselves in the experiences of complete strangers?
A country that discourages its young people from writing risks losing far more than a generation of novelists or journalists. It risks losing some of its ability to understand itself.
The People Who Teach Us to Find Our Voices
I had brought Elizabeth Douglas, a talented young writer whom I am currently mentoring, to the dinner.
It seemed particularly appropriate to have her beside me.
Mentoring is sometimes misunderstood as a formal arrangement in which an experienced professional dispenses advice to someone younger.
In reality, the most valuable mentoring relationships are often considerably less orderly.
They involve conversations, disagreements, encouragement, criticism, introductions, unexpected opportunities and, occasionally, the uncomfortable experience of being told that something one has written is simply not good enough.
The mentor's responsibility is not to manufacture a younger version of themselves.
It is to help another person discover what makes their own voice worth hearing.
My experience with Gellhorn taught me this.
She did not encourage me to imitate her. That would have been both impossible and rather ridiculous.
What she offered was the example of a woman who took writing seriously enough to devote her life to it.
She understood that good journalism requires curiosity, discipline, courage and the willingness to look beyond what people would prefer us to see.
Her influence remains with me decades later.
There is academic evidence, too, that literary careers are rarely the solitary achievements we like to imagine.
Research led by Professor Will May at the University of Southampton examined the importance of mentoring and professional networks in the development of British poets.
Working with archives from publishers including Penguin Books and Carcanet Press, May challenged the romantic image of the isolated writer producing extraordinary work entirely through individual genius.
His research revealed the importance of correspondence, workshops, editorial relationships and informal literary communities in supporting writers who later achieved significant recognition.
The findings informed Poetry Ambassadors, a mentoring programme that supported three emerging poets over a year.
One participant, Kaycee Hill, subsequently won the inaugural James Berry Poetry Prize and secured a publishing contract with Bloodaxe Books.
These examples do not establish that mentoring guarantees literary success. Nothing does.
But they demonstrate how encouragement, professional knowledge and access to literary networks can change what becomes possible.
Sometimes a young writer needs rigorous criticism.
Sometimes they need an introduction to an editor.
And sometimes they need somebody to tell them that being frightened does not mean they do not belong in the room.
A Little Wine, a Little Hugh Grant and Some Excellent Speeches
The evening itself unfolded with the warmth and good humour that the BSME seems particularly skilled at creating.
Dan Green delivered a brilliant speech, combining genuine enthusiasm for the prize with the relaxed confidence of someone who understands both the absurdities and the responsibilities of our profession.
After a couple of glasses of wine, I became convinced that he bore a rather striking resemblance to Hugh Grant.
Whether Dan would welcome this comparison, I cannot say. I certainly intended it as a compliment.
Kirsty McGregor, one of the Society's vice chairs and editorial director of Fortune Europe, also spoke, offering an encouraging glimpse of what lies ahead for the organisation and its ambitions.
Some of what she shared was particularly interesting, but I shall exercise an unusual degree of journalistic restraint and leave those announcements to the BSME itself.
A little suspense has never harmed a good story.
And then there was Caitlin Moran.
Moran is a fascinating figure in British journalism, not least because she began writing professionally at an age when most teenagers are still trying to work out what they want to become.
She won The Observer's Young Writer of the Year competition in 1990, aged fifteen, and went on to establish a career defined by humour, candour, social observation and an unmistakably individual voice.
There is something rather fitting about a woman whose own career began with a writing competition now helping to create opportunities for another generation.
When she spoke about Phoebe's winning entry, she did so with evident affection and conviction.
She described the effect the writing had made upon her.
Meanwhile, I was sitting at the table reading the piece on my phone.
I had reached the second paragraph when I felt a knot forming in my throat.
I continued reading as Caitlin spoke.
Then Phoebe stood to address the room.
I continued reading.
And because I am Latin American, and because emotion has never been something I have considered particularly necessary to conceal, I found myself with tears in my eyes.
There are moments when professional detachment becomes rather overrated.
Phoebe's writing had done what good writing is supposed to do.
It had reached another human being.
The Acorn Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree
Phoebe's winning piece is remarkable for the confidence of its voice.
It begins with an outrageous declaration about the pleasure of smoking after a long flight and moves through humour, addiction, social rituals and the curious intimacy of strangers gathered in smoking areas.
It is irreverent, observant and unexpectedly affecting.
What makes the writing interesting is not simply its subject, but the intelligence with which Phoebe finds human behaviour inside something so ordinary.
She understands that people reveal themselves in unlikely places.
A smoking area, in her hands, becomes a small theatre of human relationships: strangers sharing lighters, conversations beginning without introductions, fleeting intimacies formed between people who might otherwise never speak.
It takes confidence to write with that kind of candour.
It takes considerably more skill to make a reader laugh and then, almost without warning, feel something deeper.
There is a natural rhythm to her writing, an instinct for observation and an ability to recognise the comedy in human weakness without entirely losing sight of its sadness.
These are qualities that cannot be produced merely by following the latest advice about how to write a successful article.
They come from paying attention.
And Phoebe pays attention.
I understood why Caitlin had chosen her.
I also understood why that young woman standing nervously in front of me at the beginning of the evening had absolutely no reason to apologise for being there.
Later, Phoebe shared her own impressions of the dinner with me.
Her usual celebratory meal, she explained, would involve ordering two sides at Nando's. The rather grander surroundings had initially terrified her, but she had found everyone kind and welcoming.
She told me that the opportunity already felt life-changing.
And, perhaps most touchingly, she rejected the old warning about never meeting one's heroes. Caitlin, she said, had been warmer and funnier than she had hoped, and she was looking forward to continuing their mentoring relationship.
There was something lovely about that.
An established writer had met a young woman who admired her, and rather than disappoint her, had given her another reason to believe in the profession she hoped to enter.
We do not always appreciate how much responsibility comes with being admired.
A careless remark from someone established can discourage a young person for years.
A thoughtful gesture can remain with them for a lifetime.
I know this because I still remember Martha.
The People Behind the Evening
It would be impossible to write about this dinner without acknowledging the women whose work helped make it such a welcoming occasion.
Nathalie Ginvert, the BSME's account manager, and Juliette McCrimmon, its events director, deserve particular recognition.
Their organisation was seamless, but what impressed me most was something less easily measured: the genuine warmth with which they welcomed the younger members of the writing community.
This is not confined to one dinner. It is something I have observed in the Society's wider programme of events.
Professional organisations frequently speak about supporting the next generation. Far fewer consistently create environments in which young people feel comfortable enough to participate.
There is a difference between inviting somebody into a room and making them feel they belong there.
Nathalie and Juliette understand that difference.
The prize itself has also been made possible through industry support, with Mantis as its inaugural headline sponsor and contributions from Anthem, Bauer Media, C+D, Delayed Gratification, Future Publishing, Haymarket, Ralph, Stylist, Tickaroo and individual supporters.
Such partnerships matter because meaningful opportunities require resources.
Encouragement is essential, but young writers also need to be paid, published, trained and introduced to people who can help them build sustainable careers.
Good intentions alone will not pay a young journalist's rent.
Why We Must Keep the Door Open
By the end of the evening, I found myself thinking less about the prize itself and more about what it represented.
The BSME had brought together an extraordinary collection of established editors and media professionals, not to celebrate their own achievements, but to recognise someone whose career is only beginning.
There is a quiet generosity in that decision.
Journalism is an industry that can become consumed by its own difficulties: declining revenues, shrinking editorial teams, changing technology, the pressure of social media and the increasingly uncertain economics of independent writing.
These concerns are real.
But they should never become an excuse to stop investing in new voices.
If anything, they make that investment more urgent.
The next generation will inherit a profession considerably different from the one in which many of us began. They will need technical skills, commercial understanding and the ability to navigate an information environment that changes almost daily.
But they will also need the qualities that have always distinguished good writers: curiosity, integrity, compassion, courage and the discipline to tell a story properly.
No technology can relieve us of the responsibility to nurture those qualities.
And no award, however generous, can replace the personal encouragement that allows a young writer to believe their work matters.
I thought again about Elizabeth, sitting beside me, and about the responsibility I have accepted in mentoring her.
I thought about Phoebe, who had arrived so nervous and had gradually begun to enjoy the attention she had earned.
And inevitably, I thought about Martha Gellhorn.
When I met her at seventeen, I could not have imagined the life that writing would eventually give me. I did not know the people I would meet, the places I would visit, the stories I would tell or the responsibilities I would one day carry.
I only knew that a remarkable woman had taken an interest in a young girl who was still trying to find her place in a foreign country.
Decades later, I found myself standing in a London restaurant, asking another young woman whether she needed a hug.
Perhaps that is how literary traditions really survive.
Not simply through books, prizes or famous names, but through the willingness of one generation to recognise something valuable in the next.
Phoebe Evans has won £12,000 and the opportunity to learn from one of Britain's most distinctive contemporary writers. She has also earned the attention of an industry that can now help her turn a remarkable beginning into a lasting career.
I hope she continues writing with precisely the same wit, honesty and irreverence that brought her to that dinner.
I hope she never becomes too respectable to be funny, too successful to be curious, or too frightened of criticism to take risks.
And I hope that one day, many years from now, she finds herself standing in front of another nervous young writer.
Perhaps she will remember that evening in Soho.
Perhaps she will remember Caitlin.
Or perhaps she will remember that somebody asked whether she needed a hug.
And she will know exactly what to do.
Read Phoebe Evans's winning article: The Acorn Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree, available through the BSME Young Writers' Prize website.
For aspiring young writers: The next BSME & Caitlin Moran Young Writers' Prize is scheduled to open in February 2027. Young people interested in entering can register for updates through the BSME website.
For publishers, businesses and potential sponsors: The BSME welcomes support for its Young Writers' Prize, helping provide financial awards, mentoring and professional opportunities for emerging talent. Further information is available at www.bsme.com/young-writers-prize.
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