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You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2012 / For Your Reading Pleasure (TL;Ta-Nehisi edition)

For Your Reading Pleasure (TL;Ta-Nehisi edition)

by Tom Levenson|  September 29, 20124:06 pm| 26 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Stuff About Black People Written By a Black Person

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[BTW:  Self-aggrandizement alert]

I believe many reading this site will have already checked out Ta-Nehisi Coates much discussed “Fear of a Black President,” the cover essay in the September issue of The Atlantic.  If not, go check it out, it is smart, rich, and a fine piece of prose style.

As some of you may know, I have the pleasure of calling Ta-Nehisi my colleague this year — he’s teaching at MIT as a Martin Luther King Jr. Visiting Professor.  Better yet, his office is literally across the hall from mine, so we chat fairly often.

On the matter of “Fear of a Black President,” that exchange became more formal.  I was struck when I first read the piece by some the craft choices Ta-Nehisi and his editors had made in putting together that long and complex piece of writing.  So I asked Ta-Nehisi if he’d be willing to talk about the writing choices he had made, questions of structure and approach.  He was, and we had two sessions with a digital recorder running.  Unsurprisingly, we couldn’t confine ourselves to technical writing issues:  you make choices about how to write something based on what you’re writing about and what you intend your words to do.  So we talked about the evolution of the themes and meaning of the piece as well as questions of approach or organization.

Fast forward a couple of weeks, and, as you can  now check out the edited outcome of all this over at the Nieman Storyboard site.  (The Nieman site is a great resource for both aspiring and established journalists and writers btw, if that’s where your interests lead.)

And with that, how’s the weekend shaping up?

Pieter de Hooch, Conversation, 1663-1665.

Cross posted at Inverse Square

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Previous Post: « Can’t you hear me knocking?
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Reader Interactions

26Comments

  1. 1.

    Maude

    September 29, 2012 at 4:11 pm

    Ain’t readin’ no furrin devil. /republican

    The date on Hooch. Is that the date of the painting or was he two when he painted it?
    I am doing as little as possible.

  2. 2.

    Tom Levenson

    September 29, 2012 at 4:16 pm

    @Maude: When he painted it, I believe. Sure hope so; I wasn’t nearly as coordinated at two.

  3. 3.

    slag

    September 29, 2012 at 4:29 pm

    Wow! This is excellent! Thanks, Levenson!

  4. 4.

    Maude

    September 29, 2012 at 4:32 pm

    @Tom Levenson:
    I threw a lot of paint around at that age. It didn’t end up looking like this though.

  5. 5.

    joes527

    September 29, 2012 at 4:48 pm

    That begged a question: What did writing the piece do to its author?

    Et tu, Tom?

    BTW. I’m that far and loving it.

  6. 6.

    Linkmeister

    September 29, 2012 at 5:04 pm

    I love these “nuts and bolts” process stories. Thanks, Tom.

  7. 7.

    kilks

    September 29, 2012 at 5:05 pm

    That was really good. I love the discussion of where to put the emotional weight. I think TNC can do it because he’s done the work before, so people will give him time.

  8. 8.

    jenn

    September 29, 2012 at 5:21 pm

    THANKS! A great read.

  9. 9.

    Comradde PhysioProffe

    September 29, 2012 at 5:43 pm

    Across the hall from Coates!?!? You lucky motherfucker!!!!!

  10. 10.

    Joel

    September 29, 2012 at 5:59 pm

    Hey Tom, could you put in a good word for my wife at the Whitehead? She is applying for a professorship there.

    (Joking, natch).

  11. 11.

    A centuries old wizard

    September 29, 2012 at 6:35 pm

    I’m going to go read “Fear of a Black President” now; your interview with Coates cut through my tl;dr fear, so thanks for that.

  12. 12.

    Randy P

    September 29, 2012 at 6:55 pm

    And with that, how’s the weekend shaping up?

    Pretty good. Got a number of pain-in-the-neck errands out of the way, but also had a reasonable amount of down time.

    Got tickets to go see the Dead Sea Scrolls tomorrow night at the Franklin Institute. That will be a nice way to end the weekend.

  13. 13.

    quintillian

    September 29, 2012 at 7:19 pm

    @slag: Agreed. Thanks much, Tom. It’d be fantastic to be in the hallway and listen to you and TNC talk the craft of writing.

  14. 14.

    SBJules

    September 29, 2012 at 7:21 pm

    I have been a fan of Ta-Nehisi for a long time. I’m glad to see him get recognition.

  15. 15.

    rammalamadingdong

    September 29, 2012 at 7:43 pm

    I find it interesting that his piece is perceived as “long.” I inhaled it when it was published, and I’ve since read it about 5 more times. I suppose great writing does that. Totally envious that he is your colleague.

  16. 16.

    Schlemizel

    September 29, 2012 at 8:30 pm

    There are a lot of good things about BJ but the thing that appreciate the most is it led me to TNC. The man is a treasure and his writing a gift. The conversations over at his place are educational, entertaining and very often moving. He gives hope for man kind.

    There is a line in “As Good As It Gets” That I think of a lot when I read TNC – you make me want to be a better man.

    Have I gushed enough yet? I really like TNC a lot & would kill to have a guy like him as a friend or co-worker.

  17. 17.

    Knight of Nothing

    September 29, 2012 at 8:45 pm

    Thanks for posting! Both great reads!

  18. 18.

    parsimon

    September 29, 2012 at 8:51 pm

    TNC has deserved a wider audience for a while now.

  19. 19.

    Neldob

    September 29, 2012 at 9:00 pm

    Well, I just got finished working for a lady who chain smokes and uses perfume sticks all over her house while computer gambling and watching FOX channel.

    My weekend is now getting better. The post was a lovely swim in clean, crisp water. It makes me try to be a better person. Looking forward to reading the article and ‘Beautiful Struggle’.

  20. 20.

    HinTN

    September 29, 2012 at 9:13 pm

    If you are in or near Nashville you must plan to go to Vandy’s Neeley Hall, home of their theatre, tomorrow at 2 PM and see Dead Man’s Cell Phone. All I can say it’s, “You will not be sorry!”

  21. 21.

    Joseph Nobles

    September 29, 2012 at 10:34 pm

    Had to pause reading this midway to share this pearl: “Rush Limbaugh, bard of white decline.” That’s simply perfect.

  22. 22.

    Hob

    September 30, 2012 at 1:26 am

    This is a pleasure to read.

    As long as we’re talking about serious matters: Tom, I was amused to see that your photo looks like a cross between Richard Gere and Clancy Brown (playing the evil preacher on Carnivale).

  23. 23.

    Arclite

    September 30, 2012 at 7:49 am

    As some of you may know, I have the pleasure of calling Ta-Nehisi my colleague this year—he’s teaching at MIT as a Martin Luther King Jr. Visiting Professor. Better yet, his office is literally across the hall from mine, so we chat fairly often.

    Damn you fucker. I’m so jealous. There are very few writers I connect with, would love to chat with, and maybe chill out over a Sam Adams with. TNC is one.

  24. 24.

    peggy

    September 30, 2012 at 10:20 am

    What an amazing conversation you linked to. I’ve learned more about writing than I ever knew before. TNC rocks.

  25. 25.

    Knight of Nothing

    September 30, 2012 at 3:14 pm

    I thought about these two articles all night. I think TNC piece is required reading. Truly great journalism. Thanks again for putting it here – I don’t always check the Atlantic.

    There’s one thing in the essay that I would like to ask about – Trayvon Martin. I wasn’t paying close attention to the news cycle at that time. Did the backlash against Martin really come immediately after the president’s comments? It seemed like they were already brewing, but I could have my chronology wrong. But if it was a direct response to Obama’s comments, do people think that this backlash would have been less pronounced if Obama wasn’t president, or if he had not made the comments that he made? It seems to me that Limbaugh, Malkin, O’Reilly, et al, would have gotten around to demonizing the lad regardless of Obama’s remarks about his death. Just a minor point, really, but one that occurred to me.

    Shirley Sherrod’s story was inspiring and heartbreaking.

    Thanks again.

  26. 26.

    northquirk

    October 1, 2012 at 12:27 am

    I’m a bit late, but thank you Tom for posting this link. I’d already read TNC’s article, but reading about the back story is truly inspiring.

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