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The Press
A prolific reporter for The New Yorker assesses newspaper articles of the last decades to show that lack of competition, public regulation, and professional criticism have endangered the objectivity of the press
555 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1961
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About the author
A.J. Liebling
42 books72 followersAbbott Joseph "A. J." Liebling was an American journalist who was closely associated with The New Yorker from 1935 until his death.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 14, 2022
Perhaps the longest 290-page book (paperback) I've read in recent memory. A.J. Liebling's writings are still considered essential texts in journalism. He was the rare journalist who could write about boxing, war, food, and the media, all with the same efficacy.
To draw on a pop culture comparison, "The Press" is sort of like the journalistic version of the "Dark Souls" game. The book is a collection of Liebling's press criticisms, spanning the mid-40s up until the pre-JFK assassination 1960s.
On topics like the trial of Alger Hiss, Liebling provides little to no handholding. Same goes for newspapers and their editors and publishers. As a reader, you oftentimes feel dropped right in the middle of the story with no sense of what's going on. It's a marked contrast to today's reporting where papers like The Atlantic and The New Yorker (for which Liebling wrote the majority of what's contained in "The Press") will have their stories written in a way where a person could read them 60 years from now, and likely have a clear sense of the "who" and the "why" - whereas in the age where "The Press" was written, there was a sense that Liebling assumed his readers already had ample knowledge of the events he was writing about, and he would go straight for the analysis.
Essential? Absolutely. Difficult? Sure. Rewarding? Yes. Would I want to revisit this again? Probably not.
To draw on a pop culture comparison, "The Press" is sort of like the journalistic version of the "Dark Souls" game. The book is a collection of Liebling's press criticisms, spanning the mid-40s up until the pre-JFK assassination 1960s.
On topics like the trial of Alger Hiss, Liebling provides little to no handholding. Same goes for newspapers and their editors and publishers. As a reader, you oftentimes feel dropped right in the middle of the story with no sense of what's going on. It's a marked contrast to today's reporting where papers like The Atlantic and The New Yorker (for which Liebling wrote the majority of what's contained in "The Press") will have their stories written in a way where a person could read them 60 years from now, and likely have a clear sense of the "who" and the "why" - whereas in the age where "The Press" was written, there was a sense that Liebling assumed his readers already had ample knowledge of the events he was writing about, and he would go straight for the analysis.
Essential? Absolutely. Difficult? Sure. Rewarding? Yes. Would I want to revisit this again? Probably not.
August 17, 2015
Yes, yes, print media is dead; we've all heard the bad news, and some of us even believe it. Liebling wouldn't have believed it, and he would have been right. The same problems in different masks haunt the current ways of disseminating information (though the characters are less fascinating, dang it!). But don't read this because it reflects our time as well as Liebling's; read it because it's irresistible fun.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews