Fraser wrote in a
fashion that was described to me as like a charismatic man who stops you on the
street, grabs you by the lapels, and proceeds to tell you what the hell is
going on. If there was bullshit in it, I couldn’t detect it. I was 23 and
intoxicated with the idea of working in the same business as John Fraser.
Literally, chasing a passion, following my bliss, as myth maven Joseph Campbell
advised.
Now in 2018, forty
years on, what have we got? Newspapers? Magazines? Is that how 23-year-olds get
their news?
Nope. We’ve got
Reddit, Facebook, Twitter. Here’s an education, the big read in the current New
Yorker by Andrew Marantz http://bit.ly/2GoKuZs.
Call Marantz a John Fraser throwback, somebody who has not lost the thread of
what it means to chase the story. Damn thing is how and where do 23-year-olds
in North America get their news? Go ahead, read the story.
There is a direct
line from the collapse of the Democracy Wall movement to the rise of autocracy,
of hate spheres of influence enabled by “news” sites like Reddit.
Still, I’m a
diehard believer in the power (and the glory) of the honestly conveyed story. I
mean, what other choice do I have?
Next: Running for Your Life: Notes About Coetze’s “The
Schooldays of Jesus”
