The Mackerel Wrapper

A weblog for Pete Ellertsen's mass communications students at Benedictine University Springfield.

Saturday, December 29, 2007

Quotes and an article: Literature and journalism

Succinct.

This wisdom comes from a compilation of quotes by Ben Hecht, Chicago newspaper columnist and Hollywood screen writer, who therefore knew what he was talking about:
The rule in the art world is: you cater to the masses or you kowtow to the elite; you can't have both.
And this from Ernest Hemingway, the novelist and former Toronto Star correspondent:
Newspaper work will not harm a young writer and could help him if he gets out of it in time.
The quote, which comes from a Paris Review interview with George Plimpton, is cited in an article titled "Journalists with Literary Ambitions No Less Satisfied with Their Jobs." It appeared in 2006 in the Newspaper Research Journal.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Blog Archive

About Me

Springfield (Ill.), United States
I'm a retired English, journalism and cultural studies teacher at Springfield College in Illinois (acquired by Benedictine University and subsequently closed). I coordinate jam sessions for the "Clayville Pioneer Academy of Music" at Clayville Historic Site and the Prairieland Strings dulcimer club, and I sing in the choir and the contemporary praise team at Peace Lutheran Church in Springfield. On Hogfiddle I post links and video clips for our sessions and workshops on the mountain dulcimer (a.k.a. "hog fiddle"), as well as research notes on folklore and cultural studies, hymnody and traditional Anglo-Celtic and Scandinavian music. I also posted assignments and readings in my interdisciplinary humanities classes. The Mackerel Wrapper (now on hiatus), carried assignments and readings for my mass comm. students. I started teaching b/log when I chaired SCI-Benedictine's assessment committee, and reopened it as the privatization of public schools grew increasingly troubling and closer to home.