New York Times columnist Frank Rich is leaving his long held post for another at New York Magazine.
Rich says he wants to go long, that he no longer wants to feel the strain of shortening his thoughts to column length. Okay, but I’m more interested in what leads a man to write a column in the first place. Rich shares his thoughts on the matter:
For me, anyway, the point of opinion writing is less to try to shape events, a presumptuous and foolhardy ambition at best, than to help stimulate debate and, from my particular perspective, try to explain why things got the way they are and what they might mean and where they might lead. My own idiosyncratic bent as a writer, no doubt a legacy of my years spent in the theater, is to look for a narrative in the many competing dramas unfolding on the national stage. I do have strong political views, but opinions are cheap. Anyone could be a critic of the Bush administration. The challenge as a writer was to try to figure out why it governed the way it did — and how it got away with it for so long — and, dare I say it, to have fun chronicling each new outrage.
I can relate, as I too like to “stimulate debate” and “look for narrative in the many competing dramas unfolding on the national stage.” That stage at present is full tilt. Japan’s nuclear plants are melting down; gas prices are on the rise at a time when Americans can least afford it; we’re waging two wars for Empire that we will not win; class warfare is spilling into the streets and state houses of the land; our drinking water is being poisoned by natural gas drilling; kids are dropping out of high school at alarming rates, and so on.
The kind of challenges we’re facing demand that we stand together to meet them. Will we?
Rich says it is foolhardy for an opinion writer to try to shape events. I don’t know. Someone’s got to shape events.
This was a great departing column of Rich’s which should be read in its entirety. One thing that struck me is Rich’s admission that, to the contrary of what talented writers–who invariably have big egos–like to think is that we have little impact on changing minds–the best we can hope for is to spark reflection in others. This, of course, was the humble goal of Socrates.
This was a great departing column of Rich’s which should be read in its entirety. One thing that struck me is Rich’s admission that, to the contrary of what talented writers–who invariably have big egos–like to think is that we have little impact on changing minds–the best we can hope for is to spark reflection in others. This, of course, was the humble goal of Socrates.
Thanks for the comment, Deacon. But humble goals will not free us from the morass. It’s time for big hairy audacious goals, a.k.a. BHAGs.
Thanks for the comment, Deacon. But humble goals will not free us from the morass. It’s time for big hairy audacious goals, a.k.a. BHAGs.
‘…stand together to meet them. Will we?’
Thanks for asking Dber. My sad truth is, I don’t know the answer to this question anymore. Used to be I was sure we would.
Forget the suffocating cynicism that has laid waste to our sense of value and integrity. I lament the culturally systemic distraction I seem to lose ground to daily.
The narrative suggested by recent events such as ‘911’, ‘Katrina’, ‘Deep Water Horizon’, and ‘Fukushima’ (to name only a very few) is obvious enough. And yet the path to redemption is not so, failing to draw in more than a statistically insignificant number of concerned individual at any one moment.
It’s the scale of the thing that frustrates any beginning. Leadership is too easily co-opted. Familial loyalties blunt affirmative action. The community lies hidden beneath innumerable petty agendas until the biological system of sustainability is momentarily threatened.
It seems as though none of our disasters have been ferocious enough. Not until we face true planetary mortality as in the fictional examples of Stephen King’s ‘The Stand’ or Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Year of the Flood’ will the chaff be separated from the wheat.
Perhaps it is thus we find the words of wise men acknowledging humility as the most prudent course.
It will be a glad day indeed when the stirring is finished and the Gumbo is served….
‘…stand together to meet them. Will we?’
Thanks for asking Dber. My sad truth is, I don’t know the answer to this question anymore. Used to be I was sure we would.
Forget the suffocating cynicism that has laid waste to our sense of value and integrity. I lament the culturally systemic distraction I seem to lose ground to daily.
The narrative suggested by recent events such as ‘911’, ‘Katrina’, ‘Deep Water Horizon’, and ‘Fukushima’ (to name only a very few) is obvious enough. And yet the path to redemption is not so, failing to draw in more than a statistically insignificant number of concerned individual at any one moment.
It’s the scale of the thing that frustrates any beginning. Leadership is too easily co-opted. Familial loyalties blunt affirmative action. The community lies hidden beneath innumerable petty agendas until the biological system of sustainability is momentarily threatened.
It seems as though none of our disasters have been ferocious enough. Not until we face true planetary mortality as in the fictional examples of Stephen King’s ‘The Stand’ or Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Year of the Flood’ will the chaff be separated from the wheat.
Perhaps it is thus we find the words of wise men acknowledging humility as the most prudent course.
It will be a glad day indeed when the stirring is finished and the Gumbo is served….