Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2002/12/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 09:49 AM 12/27/2002 -0500, bdcolen wrote: >Barney = No argument. :-) There are many folks in newsrooms who are far >better reporters than they are writers, and vice versa. The former are >usually saved by strong editors, and the latter - well, the latter >either have good enough reporting skills to get by, or they tend to >write fluff. > >Seriously though, if someone's reporting skills are strong, the facts >can fight their way through turgid writing. I think the Towle book is an >excellent example of this; he provides an enormous amount of information >about the Mennonites, but his presentation screams "lousy writer." ;-) As the one that started all of this, I find I generally give some latitude to writers of reportage, acknowledging the focus on conveying facts in a limited format. I don't expect the Nabokovian, even from the Times. However, moving to larger tomes that require more dedication, I find it much harder to stomach the crude. Don McCullin's book, god love him, was just too painful to finish, I ended up leaving it in my hotel room in London. That said, I'm just about to start "Now Let us Praise Famous Men", both for the photographs and for the controversial Ageeian prose. ................................................... w a d e h e n i n g e r i n t e r a c t i o n d e s i g n a d o b e s y s t e m s , i n c . - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html