With 2010 and another decade fast approaching, upstart is going into 'best ever' mode. This summer, it's time to rummage through the bookshelves, dust off the reading glasses and publish the essential list of books that every journalist should read.
We've already starting compiling a compendium of reviews of books that we think make the cut and invite you to contribute both your suggestions and reviews.
By undertaking this treasure hunt, we hope to examine and uncover classic gems and contemporary works. We want to find the books that you think have changed the way we view the role of journalism. At the conclusion of our quest, upstart hopes to have compiled the essential list of #topjournobooks.
What are your books that every journalist should read?
Does newsprint classic The Press get a look in or is it all about new media and The Cult of the Amateur?
Do you prefer the investigative journalism of Bernstein and Woodward's All The President's Men or the front-line reporting of Herr's Dispatches?
Did Guy Rundle's campaign diary Down to the Crossroads uphold the drug-fuelled gonzo legacy of Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72?
And is there a style guide, dictionary, or thesaurus that you simply can't get through a sentence without consulting?
Send us your suggestions via the comments section below and upstart will endeavour to add them to our list of #topjournobooks. You can also pitch to review a book by dropping us a line at contact@upstart.net.au.
Alternatively you can join the conversation and tweet your suggestions on Twitter at #topjournobooks.
Feel free to check out and comment on the reviews already posted for the #topjournobooks list.
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Tags: #topjournobooks, All the President's Men, best ever, Book Review, books, class of 2009, Dispatches, Down to the Crossroads, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ‘72, investigative journalism, journalism, list, The Cult of the Amateur, The Press, top journalism books, top journo books
13 Comments
You Gotta Play Hurt, by Dan Jenkins
Scoop – Evelyn Waugh
The Macquarie dictionary. There is nothing worse than a journo who can’t spell and can only draw on a small vocab.
These are absolute definites for me:
* a collection of Alasair Cooke’s Letters from America – he is the ultimate story teller, and goes to show that you can find news content in the most unlikely of places
* Don Watson’s Weasel Words and Death Sentence – these are your guides to breaking out of the world of cliche and corporate new-speak
* Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Travelled, or any good book on poetry and the rhythm of words – a good journalist’s work is a pleasure to read, we are here to entertain as well as inform
- Waterhouse on Newspaper Style by Keith Waterhouse
- Dispatches by Michael Herr
- The First Casualty by Phillip Knightley
- Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
- The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce
- Vietnam-A Reporter’s War by Hugh Lunn
Towards the End of the Morning by Michael Frayn
Cameron in the Guardian, James Cameron
A Crooked Sixpence by Murray Sayle
er ..
Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky
THE CONTENT MAKERS – by Margaret Simons is brilliant! The most inspirational and motivational book I read in the journalism course. She gives you a real world view of journalism from the top of the chain to the bottom and all the other ins and outs.
William Zinsser’s On Writing Well is my go-to for sentence structure, lead ideas etc (thanks Rachel) as well as The Writers Coach by Jack Hart (thanks Chris).
And Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood is the original journalistic novel!
I recommend On Writing Well, by William Zinsser, first published in 1976.
If you take only one of Zinsser’s lessons from this book, let it be this one: “Simplify, simplify.”
His four principles of writing are hard to beat, too: Clarity; Simplicity; Brevity; and Humanity.
I also rate ‘The Writer’s Coach’ for writing style.
‘Rebel Jounalism’, the William Burchett collection is a good account of his corresepondence.
‘All The President’s Men’ is my favourite investigative journalism book (of course).
For pop culture anything by Hunter S. Thompson and Chuck Klosterman. Also ‘On The Road’ by Jack Kerouac.
George Orwell should be on the readings list for all first-year journo students.
For sport journos I really liked ‘Moneyball’ by Michael Lewis. ‘The Cricket War’ by Gideon Haigh is a great journalistic account of the Packer years.
Gotta add Joan Didion’s The White Album
I recommend Norwegian journalist/author Åsne Seierstad:
+ The Bookseller of Kabul (2003)
+ One Hundred And One Days: A Baghdad Journal (2005)
+ Angel of Grozny: Inside Chechnya (2007)
For a sense of magazine journalism in an era of typewriters, smoking and drinking, read James Thurber’s The Years With Ross.