Second Read : Writers Look Back at Classic Works of Reportage
Synopsis : Second Read : Writers Look Back at Classic Works of Reportage - November 2011
In the Columbia
Journalism Review's Second Read series, distinguished journalists
rediscover the works of reportage that inspired and informed their writing and
careers. As they revisit these seminal books, contributors address such ongoing
concerns as the conflict between narrative flair and accurate reporting, the
legacy of New Journalism, the need for reporters to question their political
assumptions, the limitations of participatory journalism, and the temptation to
substitute "truthiness" for hard, challenging fact. Representing a wide range of
views, this collection embodies the diversity and dynamism of nonfiction
reporting and offers new perspectives on key works by such figures as Norman
Mailer, Tom Wolfe, Rachel Carson, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The anthology also
highlights pivotal moments and movements in journalism while offering rare
insight into award-winning writers and their innovative techniques.
The anthology
includes, among many other enlightening essays, Rick Perlstein on Paul Cowan's
The Tribes of America; Nicholson Baker on Daniel Defoe's A Journal
of the Plague Year; Dale Maharidge on James Agee's Let Us Now Praise
Famous Men; Marla Cone on Rachel Carson's Silent Spring; Ben
Yagoda on Walter Bernstein's Keep Your Head Down; Ted Conover on
Stanley Booth's The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones; Jack Shafer
on Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test; Connie Schultz on
Michael Herr's Dispatches; Michael Shapiro on Cornelius Ryan's The
Longest Day; Douglas McCollam on John McPhee's Annals of the Former
World; Tom Piazza on Norman Mailer's Armies of the Night; Thomas
Mallon on William Manchester's The Death of a President; Miles Corwin
on Gabriel Garcia Marquez's The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor; David
Ulin on Joan Didion's Slouching Toward Bethlehem; and Claire Dederer on
Betty MacDonald's Anybody Can Do Anything.
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