Literary Journalism

Crazy cat ladies always make great profiles.

I really liked this piece. Susan Orlean has such a flair for satire and her often sardonic tone measured equal parts with background information and professional sources made this article a really great piece to read and reread. This story has some insightful social commentary within it. Since Orlean is the author we've read most in this class I want to dive deeper into her style, tendencies and ideas.

1.) What implications is Orlean making about society with the character of Joan Byron-Marasek? She seemed to perfectly embody the need to own and consume with no deeper purpose.

2.) Using the question above as a jumping off point, how does Orlean use the ideas of bureaucracy and legal inadequacies, suburban sprawl, and the overwhelming population of privately owned tigers as greater illustrations of unnecessary expansion and lack of accountability?

3.) Orlean consistently has great opening paragraphs. How did this one influence your perception of the story and it's tone?

4.) Orlean juxtaposes both the affluent neighbor's opinions as well as the trucking company owner's in direct correlation to each other and sets it in between the population boom digression and the city hall meeting. What do you think her reasoning is for this?

5.) There were a lot of references to the Six Flags animal theme park.
Why did Orlean so often make sarcastic remarks about it and how did that compare with later when she talked about the fate of unwanted tigers in such parks.

6.) How does Orlean's use of statistical and professional sources help the pacing, organization and overall structure of the article?

I'm looking forward to the dual Susan Orlean discussion tomorrow.

Susan Orlean's Lost Dog (You Know What I mean)

MY TURN YA'LL!- The Lost Dog: Susan Orlean

This has been by far one of my favorite pieces we have read in this class.
I'm really feeling Susan Orlean's writing. I remember in the beginning of this qtr. Scott briefly talked about this piece and I was really excited to get to it. Though its not as serious as a topic like the pieces we have read lately (A Sea Story, B-29 etc.) I felt so sympathetic with Bell and Morris. This is an experience many of us can probably relate to and I think Orlean portrays this familiarity very well.

1. how did her writing style, whether it be her diction or structure, help you to relate with the characters in the article? Do you think she did this on purpose?

2. Did you like the way she presented the search for the lost dog?

3. Do you see a connection to how she wrote this piece and "The American man At age Ten"?

4. Does her style of writing work to intensify a situation such as the lost dog?

5. How were the incorporated quotes vital to this pieces' overall effectiveness? What purpose did they serve to you as a reader?

6. How did the ending make you feel about the piece as a whole? Did you like the fact that its not "finished" and that they never catch the culprit?

7. Why do you think she decided to end the piece in this way?

Those are just a few questions which will give you a brief sense on what we will discuss about this piece tomorrow. I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did. Happy Halloween!

How to Access the Essays

To access the readings for Monday from your off-campus house, the easiest thing to do is click on this link:

https://vpn.nacs.uci.edu/webvpn.html

Then enter your UCINet ID and password.  It will then prompt you for the address of the document you want to access.  Copy the address of the link you want to open into that form and you should be good to go.  If it isn't, send me an email and we can make arrangements.

A Sea Story

To be honest, I was not all that excited to read and analyze "A Sea Story" by William Langeweische, upon first seeing it. Whooo, a story about a sinking ship…and to top it off I'm not even a fan of boats, or any type of sailing (bad experiences), so that didn't help interest me more. And all that the article appeared to be, at least at first, was a recounting of sinking of a luxurious ferry. I assumed it would be all technical aspects being explored, unless a random love story would pop up involving some high class woman and a third class passenger a lá Titanic. But Langeweische goes beyond the technical facet of the sinking of the ship, and focuses more on the atmosphere aboard the ship's last moments. Here are some questions:

What do you think the main focus of the article is? "A Sea Story" seems to be more a story about the human condition in the midst of horrific events, such as this. Langeweishe constantly notes about the struggle the passengers faced, the "race" they were in, and the subsequent actions and means they took to try and survive. Do the narratives of Thiger and Sorman help the story?

Langeweishe uses a very stylized mode of writing, using much descriptive, gripping vocabulary, and often making dramatic observations concerning the ordeal. Does this help the article become more gripping, or does Langeweishe instead come off a bit exaggerated and theatrical?

In Thiger's narrative, Thiger runs into an acquaintance, yet the person is never identified and given a name. However, in Sorman's account, the woman Sorman was with for most of his narrative does get a name, even though she is mentioned less in comparison to Thiger's "acquaintance". Do you think there is any reason for this? Or is it possible that Thiger just may not have remembered his acquaintance's name or failed to mention it?

The structure of the article starts out very chronological, with Langeweishe using specific times to tell the events. Whether he may be stating at 7:00 PM such and such was going on, or using phrases like, "a half a minute later" and "five minutes before", units of time were used to progress the story. Then as the story goes on Langeweishe abandons that approach and the concept of time is then lost amidst the chaos on the boat. Granted, if you're trying to save yourself from drowning, you're not going to be checking your watch to know the time. So then does that method help create or sustain tension? Are there any other effects within the narrative that helped construct tension?

Thinking about Profiling

So you think you want to write a profile?  Well, it doesn't matter what you think, because you have to if you want to pass the class.  So I'm forcing you to write a profile (there, that sounds better) and you can't find a suitable subject?  The first thing I'd do is read this short article about how to think like a literary journalist.  The second thing I'd do is start bouncing ideas around in the comment section below this post. 

I've already talked to some of you in an informal way about your subject and have been impressed by the quality of the initial ideas.  I also recommend looking at what other literary journalism students have written.  (Most of those articles weren't written for LJ20, but I know one of Sheena Tahilramani's was.) 

Class Reading

Due to a series of increasingly silly transcription errors on my part, we have nothing to read this Friday.  We were supposed to read the two Orlean essays, then the Lethem on Monday, the Berube on Wednesday and the Langewiesche on Friday.  Would it be too much to ask to have you read two more Susan Orlean essays by Friday?  We can discuss this in class tomorrow.

Secret of the B29

Mr. Siegel's piece was extremely enjoyable, it is far more interesting in retrospect than when actually reading the story.  The reason being all the elements of the story, the back stories, the intertwining narratives, all seem to come together in a very "Lock, Stock, Two Smoking Barrels" sort of way.  The most interesting parts of this article is in the narrative structure, the tone, and the conclusion of the piece, here are some questions that we will discuss tomorow morning:

How does Mr. Siegel use foreshadowing to make this article more captivating? how does it compare with his other article that we read?

How does Mr. Siegel assert his own opinion of the case into the story?
what effect does his opinion have on the tone of the artlce?

What is the main narrative of the story and how does the digressions strengthen the main narrative?

How does the structure of the article help to strengthen or weaken it?
Why is the chronology of the story important in telling this story? How is it used?

See you all in class today, sorry about the late post, I'm sure there'll be alot of political digressions in class.

The Ga-Ga Years

Joseph Nocera's "Ga-Ga Years" is a piece that some, at first, may see as an information piece striving to be something more than it can ever be. I am prepared for reactions similar to Quammen's article, but let's delve a little deeper!!! Nocera's specialty is the business market, and he uses sharp humor to keep his readers above the heavy topic of money. Here are a few questions:

1. How does Nocera's use of second person pronouns make the reader a part of the story? Is it useful and engaging? Does it provide the readerwith a movie-scene like quality? Or is it condescending, as if he is invading into a most private part of our lives.
2. Is the piece a sardonic one? Does Nocera scoff at the instability of the stock market and it's participants? Or is he "gung-ho"?
3. What is the significance of the timeline and it's effectiveness?  Let's relate the timeline to Quamman's sectionalizing of his article.
4. Lastly, let's talk about the lack of the types of digressions thatwe have seen so far in class. Nocera uses segments to digress instead of digressions within a scene of paragraph as obviously as other writers. What is Nocera's purpose and his effectiveness?

Notes for Monday, 17 October 2005

First, we forgot to applaud Karen for her efforts today.  She valiantly defended Quammen against the scurrilous attacks of you ruffians, and for that she deserves a round of applause.

Also, the plan for the rest of the quarter can be found below.  If you don't see your name down (or have already talked to me but haven't yet decided what you'll present on) send me an email.

Does anyone want to go to Marie Calendars? All this talk about pi has made me hungry.

When I started reading "The Mountains of Pi", I knew that I would either love the article or hate it. Forty pages about pi has the definite possibility of being incredibly redundant or dull. However, I really enjoyed this article, both for the subject matter (which I became more and more invested in) and the writing style. I loved Preston's incorporation of interesting quotes from the Chudnovsky brothers, such as "Nothing unpleasant will happen to you. We will not turn *you* into digits." The story is also built around digressions. While the main narrative focuses on Preston's interaction with the Chudnovsky brothers as they build their supercomputer to calculate pi to over 2 and a half billion digits, the digressions create side narratives. Among others, these include the Chudnovsky brother's childhood, Gregory's illness, competitors and their supercomputers, and the history of pi (as well as a brief history of the Chudnovsky family). The digressions add layers to the base story of a couple of mathematicians computing pi – we get a history lesson, but because of involvement with the stories of the people, we forge a human-interest bond as well.

A few questions to ponder (since I hope to discuss them, and many more, in class):

1) The technical subjects of circuit boards, internal cooling systems, and parallel processors seem to belong to a detailed aspect of technology that most people do not analyze. How is Preston able to simplify what must be a complicated machine and process for the common reader?

2) Preston repeatedly contrasts the normalities of some aspects of the Chudnovsky life with their more abstract, math- focused lives. At points they are portrayed as computer junkies, obsessed beyond all rational reason with calculating pi. How do these contrasts impact you as a reader?

3) I'm guessing that few of us (as literary journalism majors) have spent more time on pi that was necessary – say, memorizing it as 3.1419 and knowing that you need it for a couple of calculus tests. How does Prestonhelp us relate to the brothers? At what points do you feel distant?

4) On page 135, Preston includes a rather random paragraph on Zacharias Dase, a "human supercomputer" who was able to calculate pi to 200 decimal places. The idea of human calculations amidst the focus on supercomputers seemed odd to me. What do you think is the purpose of including his story amongst that of the Chudnosky's and the theoretical applications of pi to life?

5) Do you feel that the addition of the history of pi (first noted by the Egyptians, then analyzed in Greece, then in Germany, etc) adds to the story, or detracts from it? Was this digression helpful in understanding the complexities and timelessness of pi? Or was it excess information that people skimmed over?

6)Can you tell that I am really bad at making up questions for people to ponder?

7)Finally, do you feel as enlightened about pi as I do?

After I finished reading "The Mountains of Pi," I reflected on Preston's writing style. Sure, there were digressions. Almost every paragraph focuses on something completely different from the one before it, and the one following it. At times there are complete jumps in thought, other times it seems logical and flowing. It dawned on me that even in Preston's article there is a reflection of pi. There is ordered randomness – logical chaos. At times there is repetition. There is a constant feeling of uncertainty – you can never deduce what will come next. The writing becomes a mirror of its subject matter, embodying the idea that pi is not limited to the Chudnosky's m0 – it is in nature, writing, and human existence.
-Lauren Biron