Profile in Courage (MSM Oriana Fallaci Barf Alert)

Janinedigiovanni.com ^ | December 2006 | Janine di Giovanni

[khnyny]

In 1985, when I first saw this photograph of Oriana Fallaci - or La Fallaci, as she referred to herself - I was a student at the Iowa Writer's Workshop: a displaced East Coast girl, unhappy in the cornfields among my cutthroat fellow students. I remember staring at Fallaci's surly expression, her dark nail varnish and burning cigarette, and thinking she was beautiful. Her deep-set eyes had a lived-in look: She saw the world for what it ws and did not give a damn how it regarded her back.

Seeing this sophisticated Italian, I realized how out of place I was in Iowa. At 23, I had not lived enough to have strong material for fiction. Most of all, I did not think I could sit for five years at a kitchen table sriting a novel. Someone once said journalism is the first draft of history. I wanted to be writing that draft.

[khnyny]

In the headline of the story: "Oriana Fallaci's interviews were the paradigm of fearless journalism. Janine di Giovanni followed in her footsteps - until she saw where the path led".

When I first read this piece on Fallaci, I thought it might be a reflection and rememberance of Fallaci and her work. Instead, it is a testament to the intense arrogance and narcissistic navel gazing of the writer of the piece. I wanted to post it to show the complete idiocy and unconscious arrogance of this MSM writer. To me, it really mirrors and encapsulates everything that's completely wrong with MSM "reporters" and "writers".

DiGiovanni is inspired and attracted to reporting by Fallaci's work, and obviously admires Fallaci, but the writer makes the monumental mistake of continually comparing herself to Fallaci and making the entire piece a narcissistic rant all about herself. It turns into a juvenile game of one upsmanship, with the writer coming out ahead of Fallaci, of course, because in DiGiovanni's mind, she's made superior choices, both in her obviously biased, leftist world views and in her personal life. It's amazing to me that people in the MSM, like DiGiovanni, who are so utterly clueless manage to continually get published.

[khnyny]

Ping.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I couln’t read the page you linked -— the type was too small ——but it looks like I didn’t miss much...

[NYer]

I wanted to post it to show the complete idiocy and unconscious arrogance of this MSM writer.

No doubt she is a great fan of Christiane Amenpour.

[Hank Kerchief]

The depth of ignorance of those who claim to be champions of freedom and lover of liberty is both breathtaking, and totally bewildering. How such could dismiss one of the true modern heroes of individualism, integrity, freedom, and virtue is incredible. Read a little about this woman and feel the smallness of your own feeble actions toward freedom. There is no more outspoken person in the world warning against the dangers of Islamism than Oriana was.

• Roman Candle Oriana Fallaci sheds heat and light..
  
  
• Oriana's Screed.
  
  
• Oriana Fallaci Journalist, Interviewer and Author.
  
  
• Rage and Pride Original Essay, September 29, 2001.
  
  
• Unquiet on the Western Front.
  
  
• A Sermon for the West

  Hank

[Hank Kerchief]

My post above was especially to you.

Hank

[Hank Kerchief]

My post above was especially to you.

Hank

My post above was especially to you.

Hank

[niteowl77]

I was a student at the Iowa Writer's Workshop: a displaced East Coast girl, unhappy in the cornfields

The angst! The A-a-a-a-ngst!!!

There have long been plenty of displaced East Coast and suburban Chicago students in the Iowa Writers Workshop... many of them likely to be - or have been - unhappy in the cornfields. The good news is that since there isn't much corn grown on the U of I campus or downtown Iowa City, they don't need to worry overmuch. Granted, they might become downright depressed near Springdale... maybe even suicidal when traveling between Solon and Mount Vernon... but kept within the confines of Gommorah on the Iowa, I always found them to be content, if not necessarily happy.

Intense arrogance and narcissistic navelgazing has become, de facto, James Hearst's lasting legacy.

Mr. niteowl77

[khnyny]

I don’t know what kind of computer you have, but if you click on the aritlce then click “view” you can change the text size for easier viewing.

[khnyny]

Thanks for the links.

[Mrs. Don-o]

No, I clicked the “view: largest” and nothing happens. If there were some way to change Janine di Giovanni’s magazine page into regular text?-—

[khnyny]

Thanks for the insight, lol.

I found the article and this writer to be absurd. This writer wrote another article on a woman WWII war correspondent and somehow tried on the woman’s clothes(?) and then proceeded to write that this woman was “less busty.” Totally loony. Once I read this writer’s piece on Fallaci, I knew there was more lunacy to be found. I have a strange sense of humour.:)

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/21/style/tmagazine/21miller.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

“I had come to trawl through Miller’s letters, her notebooks from World War II; her negatives, her prints; and finally, in the room that was her bedroom, slip on her wool war-correspondent’s uniform made on Savile Row shortly before the D-Day invasion. It nearly, but not quite, fit. Her arms were shorter than mine, she was less busty.”