Book Review: Confessions of an American Media Man by Tom Plate - Page 2

Reading that passage, you can visualize with ease the uncomfortable silence, the plaintive question, Plate's turbid feelings as the elevator closes. It would simply be a great scene for a movie, and there are similar scenes throughout the text. Plate might want to eschew journalism and take up script writing.

The book does get wordy on occasion, with passages that must be waded through. For example: “This put tremendous pressure (unprecedented at the Los Angeles Times) on any new editorial page editor who inherited, on the one hand, a staff from his predecessor that was decidedly liberal, while reporting, on the other hand, to a publisher and editor who were ordinarily exceptionally cautious by nature and geared up to worry about Orange County’s post-Goldwater sensibilities.” I got lost at “on the other hand.”

Confessions contains pointed thoughts on the responsibilities of newspapers, magazines, journalists, and reporters. It should motivate any of us who are writing to be thoughtful when we add our words to the media.

Article Author: Gray Hunter

Gray Hunter enjoys an eremitical life in the desert. Beer and words are two pleasures in his life. He holds down two jobs while he works at his novels and stories.

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