David Halberstam died in a car crash today; he was 73.
He wrote essential books: The Best and the Brightest is possibly the best introduction to the Vietnam War, The Powers That Be possibly the best single volume on the rise of the modern media.
I can still remember the way he started Best and the Brightest, painting the contrast between the old Robert Lovett and the young JFK, one cold day in December 1960.
But Halberstam was also a sports fan, and wrote sports books, almost as though the grace and tedium of baseball, the discipline of basketball, held a Shakespearean mirror up to (American) nature. (My own favorite is Summer of ‘49, a narrative about the pennant race between the Yankees and the Red Sox centered on the rivalry of two true titans: Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams.)
He won a Pulitzer Prize for his Vietnam reporting, but —- at least for this particular journalist —- it was when he left daily journalism and turned to the writing of books (I think he wrote a total of 21) that he became a role model, the one nonfiction writer many wanted to be.
It must have been under his influence, when I read him with intensity in late high school and throughout college, that I learned what I thought then and still think now is a fundamental aesthetic principle: All art aspires to the condition of a book.
His conception of journalism as a profession, a trade, that can be practiced through books is inspiring. It’s journalism in depth, journalism as extended narrative, journalism as second draft or perhaps even clean copy of history. The question a Filipino journalist must ask, however, is: Has anyone in Philippine journalism been inspired enough to actually make a career writing journalistic books?
I suppose economics will supply the answer immediately. A career? Perhaps not. But the occasional book-length journalism? A few come to mind.
POSTSCRIPT
Howie Severino, if I’m not mistaken, was the first Filipino blogger to post on Halberstam’s death (and influence). Gibbs Cadiz has a link to a commencement address the writer gave. Caloy Conde links to his paper’s obituary.
May 13th, 2007 at 3:44 pm
“Has anyone in Philippine journalism been inspired enough to actually make a career writing journalistic books?”
I can think of a few who devoted chunks of their careers to producing journalistic books: Marties Vitug wrote a landmark book on logging, Power from the Forest, before writing two other non-fiction books on southern Philippines;
Cris Yabes wrote Boys from the Barracks, about coup plotters, then Journey of Scars, a personal memoir of her travels, and another book on the vanishing script of the Pala’wan; and Conrado de Quiroz of course wrote Dead Aim, a book about martial law that was almost as ambitious as a Halberstam book and a pretty good read too.
April 26th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Like you, John, Summer of ‘49 was my first introduction to David Halberstam, and it was a wonderful look into the pennant race for that year, when the Yankees and Red Sox battled it out for American League supremacy all the way to the end of the season.
Halberstam and his creative prose will be missed.
April 25th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
[…] to fall. Placeholder looks at the Jeffersonian and Madisonian models for economic development. In Inquirer Current, John Nery pays tribute to David […]
April 25th, 2007 at 11:06 am
I still have his book on Michael Jordan: “Playing for Keeps : Michael Jordan and the World He Made”. Plus all those retrospectives he made with the NBA. He will be missed.
April 25th, 2007 at 1:03 am
Thanks for your piece on David Halberstam, one of my favorite writers, and my all-time favorite sports book writer.
Thanks too for the book excerpt. It certainly reminded me of how well Halberstam wrote.
But the excerpt also gave another insight into the man- he seemed always to be fascinated by transitions, those moments before irreversible change.
He captured that period between the time America believed in, then realized the quagmire that was the Vietnam War.
He chronicled the time when Japan was emerging as a giant in automobile production.
He chose the Summer of 49′ , as if to liken the purity of American baseball during those times with the soon-to-be-lost innocence of pre-Vietnam war America
He wrote about a champion basketball team in Breaks of the Game, during their post-championship decline
Somehow he captured the excitement of an eagle about to take flight, as well as the tension of precious crystal about to fall off the edge of a table.