Baker, Russell. The Good Times. New York: Penguin 1990. Print
First Sentences:
My mother, dead now to this world but still roaming free in my mind, wakes me some mornings before daybreak.
Description:
I cannot imagine a better book that portrays the newspaper world -- from writing to newsroom to drinking to bosses -- than Russell Baker's The Good Times. Covering his years as a delivery boy for the Baltimore News-Post to police reporter and later newsman for the Baltimore Sun to Chief of the Sun's London Bureau, Baker cheerfully recalls his youthful impressions, preconceived notions, hero-worship, and reality behind his various roles in creating a newspaper piece.
In his youth, Baker's family often presented him with the exemplary image of his Cousin Edwin who once had been managing editor for The New York Times. This unseen figure, to the young Baker, was a man to be admired for his wit, accomplishments, and writing skills for a highly-respected media outlet. Baker felt a strong compulsion to follow in his footsteps.
As a result, he spent seven years at the Baltimore Sun, where he started as a novice police reporter and learned to "rewrite, write features, edit copy, do makeup, crop pictures, write captions, and compose headlines that fit." Later, he moved up to become the Sun's London correspondent.
I admit to knowing nothing about the newspaper publishing business beyond my junior high school writing for our student paper, the Eleanor Joy Toll Tollagram. But The Good Times cleverly walks Baker (and us readers) through the various stages of becoming a reporter, from chasing sirens to writing of foreign events in London, political writing, eventually a personal column.
Baker is a clever, humorous, and highly entertaining writer who is capable of both self-deprecating and biting commentary about others. The Good Times is a quality read for anyone interested in newspapers, reporting, and great writing. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about all of this.
First Sentences:
My mother, dead now to this world but still roaming free in my mind, wakes me some mornings before daybreak.
"If there's one think I can't stand, it's a quitter."I have heard her say that all my life. Now, lying in bed, coming awake in the dark, I feel the fury of her energy fighting the good-for-nothing idler within me who wants to go back to sleep instead of tackling the brave new day.
Description:
I cannot imagine a better book that portrays the newspaper world -- from writing to newsroom to drinking to bosses -- than Russell Baker's The Good Times. Covering his years as a delivery boy for the Baltimore News-Post to police reporter and later newsman for the Baltimore Sun to Chief of the Sun's London Bureau, Baker cheerfully recalls his youthful impressions, preconceived notions, hero-worship, and reality behind his various roles in creating a newspaper piece.
In his youth, Baker's family often presented him with the exemplary image of his Cousin Edwin who once had been managing editor for The New York Times. This unseen figure, to the young Baker, was a man to be admired for his wit, accomplishments, and writing skills for a highly-respected media outlet. Baker felt a strong compulsion to follow in his footsteps.
As a result, he spent seven years at the Baltimore Sun, where he started as a novice police reporter and learned to "rewrite, write features, edit copy, do makeup, crop pictures, write captions, and compose headlines that fit." Later, he moved up to become the Sun's London correspondent.
I arrived in Fleet Street with the police reporter's weakness for overwrought language and passion for cliches, and indulged both for the first few months. Some of my early stories read like parodies written for a burlesque on journalism.Eventually he does land a job at Cousin Edwin's newspaper, serving as The Times' White House correspondent. This is thankless job with boring days of re-writing press releases, sitting in on ambiguous briefings, drinking, and endless waiting for something big to happen. Then President Eisenhower has a heart attack in 1955. It would be an opportunity for Baker to show The Times what a great reporter he was and thereby land a more exciting job.
It slowly dawned on me that this was not just a big, big story, but the biggest story in the world, and likely to remain so for several days to come. The biggest story in the world, and it was all mine.But this White House job soon becomes less of a challenge for him.
[at age 36] I have built nothing worth leaving and don't even know how. Instead, I spend my life sitting on marble floors, waiting for somebody to come out and lie to me...From that moment on, I was emotionally ready to end my reporting days.After haggling with editors, publishers, and owners, he was finally offered a column on The Times Editorial page, "one of the gaudiest prizes in American journalism." It is here that Baker achieves his biggest spotlight and freedom to write about what he wants, and fame follows.
I admit to knowing nothing about the newspaper publishing business beyond my junior high school writing for our student paper, the Eleanor Joy Toll Tollagram. But The Good Times cleverly walks Baker (and us readers) through the various stages of becoming a reporter, from chasing sirens to writing of foreign events in London, political writing, eventually a personal column.
Baker is a clever, humorous, and highly entertaining writer who is capable of both self-deprecating and biting commentary about others. The Good Times is a quality read for anyone interested in newspapers, reporting, and great writing. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about all of this.
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If this book interests you, be sure to check out:
If this book interests you, be sure to check out:
Gill, Brendan. Here at the New Yorker.
It just doesn't get any better than to read a captivating writer (Brendan Gill) plying his craft describing a fascinating place (the New Yorker offices) and recounting the escapades of cleverly funny people (James Thurber, E.B. White, Peter Arno, and editor William Shawn). Hugely funny.
