Around the turn of page 266 of The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America, when I was about to be late for my day job, I had an unusually vivid daydream. I was at some literary event significant enough to draw A-list bylines outside the known skirt-chasing demographic, flailing past the hour mark Read More
Romenesko was nice enough to post the outtakes from Poynter Online’s interview with New Yorker staffer George Packer in which he reveals his “5 Tips for Reporting on Anything.” Packer handled the Iraq War beat for the magazine, files at the Interesting Times blog on the New Yorker’s Read More
An eager audience filled Cooper Union’s Great Hall last night as Jacob Weisberg, Slate Group’s chair, moderated “Secularism, Islam & Democracy,” a panel featuring Professor Tariq Ramadan, the Swiss-born Muslim scholar who was barred from entering the U.S. in 2004. Also on the panel was The New Yorker‘s George Packer, the Gallup Center’s Dalia Mogahed Read More
The American Museum of Natural History was occupied by writers, editors, and agents on Tuesday night, April 28, for the PEN Foundation’s annual black-tie gala.
During the pre-dinner cocktail hour in the museum’s spacious rotunda, Norton editor Bob Weil said softly that he hoped the big dinosaur skeleton mounted in the middle of the room Read More
How much worse can things get for journalists?
Newspapers and magazines are closing; the ones that remain grow thinner by the week as if somehow cursed; freelance budgets are being slashed and staffers accustomed to taking it easy are being forced to write like their livelihoods depend on it. (Hint: They do.) The Read More
Bill Kristol’s column for The New York Times has come to an end. Today’s installment of his year-old Op-Ed column ends with a curt note that reads, "This is William Kristol’s last column."
From the very start of his column last year, Mr. Kristol drew criticism from writers like The Atlantic‘s Read More
Soon after Lehman Brothers fell, and New York business writers found themselves smack in the middle of the biggest story of their careers, Fortune’s managing editor, Andy Serwer, convened a staff meeting on the second floor of their Sixth Avenue home.
He wanted to say thank you! Not only did the Read More
Critics who got an early look at Generation Kill, the new HBO miniseries about the first 40 days of the Iraq war created by Wire masterminds David Simon and Ed Burns, were treated to more than the first five (of seven) episodes on DVD. As part of a multipacket press kit, they also received a Read More
The last time The New Yorker‘s George Packer was in Iraq was January 2007. He’s not sure if he wants to go back, but that doesn’t mean it’s not on his mind. "I do find myself thinking about it all the time still," he says. "Thinking of other ways to write about it."
One of Read More
"It’s really easy to get killed in Iraq," says Phillip Robertson, a freelancer who covered the war for Salon and wrote the introduction to the book Unembedded: Four Independent Photojournalists on the War in Iraq.
"They want to kill you. All you have to do is give them a chance Read More
