About Editing and Writing

From an obit on news-leader.com by Mike O’Brien headlined “Former News-Leader executive editor Dale Freeman, known as The Ozarker, has died”:

A giant of Ozarks journalism, Dale Freeman, has died. He was 94.

Dale was a newspaperman through and through, and immensely proud of it. His favorite plaything as a child was a toy typewriter. As a teenager he was a printer’s devil in the backshop of his hometown newspaper, the Mansfield Mirror. After service in the Navy, he enrolled at the University of Missouri-Columbia and graduated from its School of Journalism while also playing on the Mizzou varsity basketball team.

From a story on dallasnews.com by Maria Halkias headlined “Dallas Morning News taps 26-year veteran as its next newsroom leader”:

The Dallas Morning News has named Katrice Hardy, a veteran journalist whose newsrooms have a track record of award-winning reporting, to be its next top editor.

Hardy, 47, joins The News next month as executive editor. She’s currently executive editor at the Indianapolis Star, which won this year’s Pulitzer Prize for national reporting, and Midwest regional editor for the USA Today Network.

Hardy becomes the first woman and Black journalist to hold The News’ top newsroom job. She also led newsrooms in Virginia and South Carolina before joining The Star in March 2020.

From a post on poynter.org by Kristen Hare headlined “Can J-schools fix news deserts?”:

It’s summer, and that means it’s intern season, and that means you might be lucky enough to feel a little extra hope for our industry if you’re spending any time with brand new journalists.

A case study out this summer suggests there deserves to be more than just a bit of hope, though.

That study, not yet published, is titled “Challenging Journalistic Boundaries: How Generation Z Journalists Are Taking On the U.S. News Desert Crisis,” and it shows how University of Kansas, Duquesne University and Northeastern University have built newsrooms for their communities.

From a New York Times obit by Sam Roberts headlined “Carol Easton, Biographer of Art Figures, Dies at 87”:

Carol Easton, whose curiosity about creativity inspired her to write biographies of four prominent figures in the arts — Stan Kenton, Samuel Goldwyn, Jacqueline du Pré and Agnes de Mille — died at her home in Venice, Calif….

“She was always fascinated with people, especially creative people in the arts,” her daughter Liz Kinnon said. “After working as a freelance writer for years, she decided she wanted to write her first biography.”

By Ray E. Boomhower

“An editor is a person who knows more about writing than writers do but who has escaped the terrible desire to write.” —E. B. White

“One must never forget that writing and editing are entirely different arts, or crafts. Good editing has saved bad writing more often than bad editing has harmed good writing.” —Gardner Botsford

“Nothing is more ephemeral than words. Moving them from the mind of a writer to the mind of a reader is one of the most elusive and difficult undertakings ever to challenge the human intelligence. This is what being an editor is all about.” —Norman Cousins

From a New York Times story by Abdi Latif Dahir headlined “The New Magazines and Journals Shaping Africa’s Literary Scene”:

KISUMU, Kenya — While he was finishing his master’s degree in creative writing in England two years ago, Troy Onyango remembers, he lamented with his friends about how few literary outlets were devoted to Black writers, poets and photographers like them.

For Onyango, he said, it was about, “How do we just find a space where we can all congregate?”

From a Wall Street Journal story by Ellen Gamerman headlined “‘The Last Thing He Told Me,’ a summer thriller about a missing tech executive, is dominating best-seller lists as the star’s company gets increasingly savvy about the way it markets and campaigns for books it backs”:

“The Last Thing He Told Me,” a bestselling thriller splayed across beach blankets this summer, isn’t part of a blockbuster series, nor is it a splashy debut or the latest from a brand-name author.

But the book’s success is no fluke.

From a story on poynter.org by Elizabeth Djinis headlined “Dear Abby, how have you stayed so popular for so long?”:

The first iteration of Slate’s long-running advice column “Dear Prudence” debuted in 1997. The questions asked in an early piece might seem quaint — or even outdated — by today’s standards.

Is it insulting to unlock the car door for a woman first now that the push of a button can unlock all doors at once, “Lovelocked” asks? Why do some neighbors deign to put holiday lights up 25 days before Christmas, “Scrooge” wonders?

From an AP story headlined “First person of color named as Houston Chronicle editor”:

Maria Douglas Reeve has been promoted to editor of the Houston Chronicle after serving as managing editor of the daily for about 20 months, owner Hearst Corp. announced. She succeeds Steve Riley, who announced his retirement in March.

Reeve joined the Chronicle in November 2019 after serving in various news management roles with the Star-Tribune in Minneapolis. The Charleston, South Carolina, native previously worked for the Star-Tribune’s Twin Cities rival, the St. Paul Pioneer Press, after beginning her journalism career as a reporter at The Bradenton Herald in Florida.

From a New York Times Inside the Best-Seller List column by Elisabeth Egan headlined “Does a Writer Ever Get Cozy on the Best-Seller List?”:

If you spend enough time scrutinizing the best-seller list, you may notice that it has a lot in common with a party. There are guests who drop in, pop a bottle of champagne and exit promptly. Others arrive with a companion, or occasionally an entourage. (These authors have more than one book on the list at the same time: Madeline Miller, Leigh Bardugo, James Patterson, Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi, to name a few.) Finally, there are guests who amble in, make themselves comfortable and stay for weeks.