Barack Obama’s complicated media-criticism tour

As you may have noticed, Barack Obama has a book out today. It’s a memoir, titled A Promised Land, that runs to more than seven-hundred pages and is still only a first volume—covering the period from Obama’s childhood to the raid, in 2011, that killed Osama bin Laden. Originally, Obama planned to write a shorter, single volume, but he ended up grappling with a surfeit of good material and with a desire to offer both rich historical detail and a compelling narrative; as he told The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, “there are parts of the book where I just had a really nice description I wanted to leave in and the editor was like, ‘Do we really need this, like, do we really?’ and I said, ‘Eh, I like it, sorry. That’s just a pretty description and I want to leave it.’” Online, every writer related and every editor winced. “Kill your darlings,” Seyward Darby, the editor in chief of the Atavist Magazine, advised. “It’s liberating, I promise.” Ahead of publication day, the former president embarked on a media tour, coverage of which has, implicitly and often explicitly, provided a marked contrast with the behavior of the soon-to-be-former president. Interviewers have asked Obama to weigh in on Trump’s refusal to concede defeat and the state of the country generally; in his answers, Obama has emphasized the centrality of America’s polarized information ecosystem in putting Trump in the White House and bolstering his unhinged claim that he gets to stay there. As Brian Stelter, CNN’s... Continue reading at 'Columbia Journalism Review'

[ Columbia Journalism Review | 2020-11-17 13:29:32 UTC ]

Other news stories related to: "Barack Obama’s complicated media-criticism tour"


John Bolton's Memoir Lands, Receives Mixed Reception from Bookstores

After months of delays due to the Trump administration's attempts to prevent its publication, John Bolton's White House memoir finally lands today—and while some booksellers are eager to sell it, others refuse to do so. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-06-23 04:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


“We Are Always Revising Our Stories — and Ourselves”: A Conversation with Maya Shanbhag Lang

GIVEN THE LONG TRADITION of memoirs written by men of a certain age and stature looking back on their life and accomplishments, the surge in memoirs by women in recent years has been quite a breakthrough. What We Carry, the new memoir by Maya Shanbhag Lang, is nothing short of radical, not just... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-06-21 12:30:36 UTC ]
More news stories like this


A Virtual Evening With Lorene Cary on Ladysitting

Lorene Cary is the author of the memoir Black Ice, three novels, a book for young readers, and a play, My General Tubman. Her one-act opera and memoir, Ladysitting, explores the author’s relationship and time spent with her grandmother Nana, a fierce and independent woman who managed a business... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-06-19 21:30:48 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Bakari Sellers wanted his memoir to spark tough talks about race. We’re already in the middle of a conflagration.

The CNN commentator and South Carolina politician wrote ‘My Vanishing America’ before the country was on fire. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2020-06-19 09:58:38 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lively memoir ‘The Watergate Girl’ tells a prosecutor’s story

Jill Wine-Banks tells of her role as a young lawyer working with Archibald Cox during the trials of those involved in the Watergate cover-up. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-06-18 21:48:36 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lively memoir ‘The Watergate Girl’ tells a prosecutor’s story

Jill Wine-Banks tells of her role as a young lawyer working with Archibald Cox during the trials of those involved in the Watergate cover-up. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-06-18 21:48:36 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lively memoir ‘The Watergate Girl’ tells a prosecutor’s story

Jill Wine-Banks tells of her role as a young lawyer working with Archibald Cox during the trials of those involved in the Watergate cover-up. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-06-18 21:48:36 UTC ]
More news stories like this


HQ scoops memoir from broadcaster and campaigner Sarpong

HQ has scooped the first memoir by June Sarpong, charting her life from early childhood in Ghana to a career as broadcaster and campaigner. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-06-18 07:55:25 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Bolton’s memoir of the Trump administration is a bestseller before its release.

The Room Where It Happened, John Bolton’s memoir of his time in the Trump administration, is the #1 bestseller on Amazon in advance of its release on June 23, even as the government has sued to slow its publication. The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, claims that Bolton did not fully cooperate with the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-06-17 16:57:46 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Trump is trying to block publication of John Bolton's book. What's he scared of? | Lloyd Green

The memoir reportedly depicts Trump as caring more about re-election than US national security. No wonder he wants to quash itOn Tuesday, the Trump administration asked a federal judge to block publication of John Bolton’s The Room Where It Happened, the former national security adviser’s... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2020-06-17 06:30:46 UTC ]
More news stories like this


In Escalation, DoJ Is Now Seeking to Block Bolton Memoir

Citing irreparable injury, the Department of Justice on Wednesday filed an emergency motion in federal court seeking a temporary restraining order to block publication of former national security advisor John Bolton's memoir 'The Room Where It Happened.' Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-06-17 04:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Maria Ressa’s conviction, and the Philippines’ dire information climate

“Evation.” Yesterday, authorities in the Philippines used that typo to convict Maria Ressa, the crusading journalist who founded the independent news site Rappler, and her former colleague Reynaldo Santos of “cyber-libel” charges. The typo appeared in a May 2012 article in which Santos linked... Continue reading at Columbia Journalism Review

[ Columbia Journalism Review | 2020-06-16 12:23:58 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Superman Returns, to Beat Up the Klan

A new Superman comic, written by Gene Luen Yang, and a medical memoir about a rare and debilitating disease are both featured in the latest Graphic Content column. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2020-06-16 09:00:09 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Is Ball Four the Greatest Baseball Memoir Ever Written?

Fifty years ago this month Jim Bouton set the baseball world on fire.  His kindling was Ball Four, a book that torched everything the game’s standard bearers held sacred. There had been sports diaries before, which, structurally-speaking, was what Ball Four was, but there had never been a sports... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-06-15 08:48:10 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Manilla signs memoir exploring womanhood and choice in Trump's America

Bonnier Books UK has acquired Christa Parravani’s "harrowing and beautifully written" memoir Loved and Wanted: A Memoir of Choice, Children, and Womanhood for its new literary imprint Manilla Press. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-06-11 17:12:09 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Personal Space: Sejal Shah on Growing Up Indian in Non-Indian Places

On this episode of Personal Space: The Memoir Show, Sari Botton interviews Sejal Shah, author of the memoir-in-essays This is One Way to Dance, published by the University of Georgia Press. Shah’s essays, many of which are about race, place, and belonging, were written over a span of 20 years,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-06-10 19:00:31 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Literature on Lockdown 8: #BlackLivesMatter

The sadness, exhaustion, anger and frustration that have been expressed by Black people across social media this week have, of course, been felt for centuries.But, by living so much through our screens right now, observing video footage, scrolling through reposted statements and infographics,... Continue reading at British Council global

[ British Council global | 2020-06-05 16:46:27 UTC ]
More news stories like this


This Week's Bestsellers: June 8, 2020

‘How to Be an Antiracist’ and other books addressing systemic racism return to our bestseller lists. Plus musician Mikel Jollett debuts with the memoir ‘Hollywood Park,’ and science journalist James Nestor discusses the importance of ‘Breath.’ Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-06-05 04:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Book Deals: Week of June 8, 2020

Among the notable deals last week were the sale of a memoir from a PBS NewsHour correspondent, a novel about a woman who gives birth to an owl, and international bestseller Michel Faber’s latest novel. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-06-05 04:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


The Late-Night Revelations in “The Shapeless Unease,” a Memoir of Insomnia

Katy Waldman reviews “The Shapeless Unease,” by Samantha Harvey, a memoir about the author’s yearlong battle with chronic insomnia. Continue reading at New Yorker

[ New Yorker | 2020-06-04 18:55:26 UTC ]
More news stories like this