4 ms·

On Being the Ideal Reader of Tom Wolfe’s School of New Journalism (2018)

12 points by conanxin 4y ago

ghaff 4y ago
While I liked reading a lot of Wolfe, I always had something of an issue with the "truthiness" (or based on a true story) of new journalism. Not just new journalism though. James Michener also wrote a lot of things that were heavily based on historical fact but had a lot of other (often non-obviously) invented content woven in. A book like The Right Stuff seems pretty rooted in historical reality but you could never be too sure when it departed.
- AndyMcConachie 4y ago
  Wolfe is a known liar. In The Electric Koolaid Acid Test he completely embellished the meeting between Tim Leary and Ken Kesey. The account in that book was written to titillate readers and in no way resembles historical fact. The idea that Wolfe can be considered a 'journalist' at all is absurd on its face.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    Of course, you're pretty much also describing more or less every biopic ever made. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a single one that doesn't play fast and loose with characters, timelines, and tons of other details.
- cafard 4y ago
  Some USAF colonel's website, http://www.nf104.com/ http://www.nf104.com/ occasionally gets linked on HN. It casts considerable doubt on the account of Yeager's crash in The Right Stuff.
freetime2 4y ago
> These journalists, Wolfe wrote, used four devices: scene-by-scene construction, realistic dialogue, a third-person point of view (where the reader feels as if he or she is inside a character’s mind), and then, in contrast to traditional newspaper journalism, a descriptive eye, in which a subject’s clothing, manners, eating, and living room are as important for the writer to document as the subject’s words. This style of nonfiction drives me absolutely bonkers. Often it is more about the author and their experiences than the thing they are puporting to write about, as if the author's subjective experiences are somehow the thing that others will find most interesting. Sometimes they are, if the author is particularly talented and has been somewhere particularly interesting, but usually they aren't. To use the phrase that Tom Wolfe coined, it is "the Me generation" in writing form. I see this style today in a lot of the "long form" journalism, and usually comes across as the author trying to say in 5,000 words what could probably said in 500. Just the relevant facts, please.
- brutusborn 4y ago
  I get the same frustration when I start an article and it tells me something like “The sunlight was kissing the ripening crop”. The only time I’ve found it useful is good gonzo journalism where the mental scene is important context. E.g. Hunter S. Thompson drug stories or stories of mystical experiences. In these articles a focus on subjective experience is necessary. For articles about things, it’s just a waste of words.
- matthewowen 4y ago
  Personally, my primary reason to read longer articles in the New Yorker is not because I get utility out of the facts that they contain. Sure I get some, but a lot of it is the same appeal as I get in reading fiction - it is simply fun to read things and to be transported. I think the fact that the New Yorker deals in both fiction and non-fiction is a sign that I am not alone in this. It’s ok if you don’t enjoy this, but I think your comment has a note of suggesting inferiority rather than just preference, and I think that’s off the mark.
cafard 4y ago
Larry McMurtry, speaking of the writer Grover Jones(?) said that the new journalists wanted the prestige of non-fiction but the liberties of fiction. (I'm sure he put it better, but my copy of the book Literary Life is elsewhere.) From the article: """ the "Hectoring Narrator," who might talk to or insult the characters; the "Downstage Voice," through which Wolfe would adopt the tone and vocabulary of one of his characters in a paragraph of background or history; and his famous use of punctuation. """ I enjoyed this when I first read Wolfe years ago, but with the latest one I read a few years ago, my feeling was "Get your elbow out of my ribs. If I'm not laughing, it isn't because I don't get the joke, it's that the joke isn't that great."

12 points by conanxin 4y ago

While I liked reading a lot of Wolfe, I always had something of an issue with the "truthiness" (or based on a true story) of new journalism. Not just new journalism though. James Michener also wrote a lot of things that were heavily based on historical fact but had a lot of other (often non-obviously) invented content woven in. A book like The Right Stuff seems pretty rooted in historical reality but you could never be too sure when it departed.

AndyMcConachie 4y ago
Wolfe is a known liar. In The Electric Koolaid Acid Test he completely embellished the meeting between Tim Leary and Ken Kesey. The account in that book was written to titillate readers and in no way resembles historical fact. The idea that Wolfe can be considered a 'journalist' at all is absurd on its face.
- ghaff 4y ago
  Of course, you're pretty much also describing more or less every biopic ever made. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a single one that doesn't play fast and loose with characters, timelines, and tons of other details.
cafard 4y ago
Some USAF colonel's website, http://www.nf104.com/ http://www.nf104.com/ occasionally gets linked on HN. It casts considerable doubt on the account of Yeager's crash in The Right Stuff.

freetime2 4y ago

> These journalists, Wolfe wrote, used four devices: scene-by-scene construction, realistic dialogue, a third-person point of view (where the reader feels as if he or she is inside a character’s mind), and then, in contrast to traditional newspaper journalism, a descriptive eye, in which a subject’s clothing, manners, eating, and living room are as important for the writer to document as the subject’s words. This style of nonfiction drives me absolutely bonkers. Often it is more about the author and their experiences than the thing they are puporting to write about, as if the author's subjective experiences are somehow the thing that others will find most interesting. Sometimes they are, if the author is particularly talented and has been somewhere particularly interesting, but usually they aren't. To use the phrase that Tom Wolfe coined, it is "the Me generation" in writing form. I see this style today in a lot of the "long form" journalism, and usually comes across as the author trying to say in 5,000 words what could probably said in 500. Just the relevant facts, please.

brutusborn 4y ago
I get the same frustration when I start an article and it tells me something like “The sunlight was kissing the ripening crop”. The only time I’ve found it useful is good gonzo journalism where the mental scene is important context. E.g. Hunter S. Thompson drug stories or stories of mystical experiences. In these articles a focus on subjective experience is necessary. For articles about things, it’s just a waste of words.
matthewowen 4y ago
Personally, my primary reason to read longer articles in the New Yorker is not because I get utility out of the facts that they contain. Sure I get some, but a lot of it is the same appeal as I get in reading fiction - it is simply fun to read things and to be transported. I think the fact that the New Yorker deals in both fiction and non-fiction is a sign that I am not alone in this. It’s ok if you don’t enjoy this, but I think your comment has a note of suggesting inferiority rather than just preference, and I think that’s off the mark.

cafard 4y ago

Larry McMurtry, speaking of the writer Grover Jones(?) said that the new journalists wanted the prestige of non-fiction but the liberties of fiction. (I'm sure he put it better, but my copy of the book Literary Life is elsewhere.) From the article: """ the "Hectoring Narrator," who might talk to or insult the characters; the "Downstage Voice," through which Wolfe would adopt the tone and vocabulary of one of his characters in a paragraph of background or history; and his famous use of punctuation. """ I enjoyed this when I first read Wolfe years ago, but with the latest one I read a few years ago, my feeling was "Get your elbow out of my ribs. If I'm not laughing, it isn't because I don't get the joke, it's that the joke isn't that great."