Tag Archives: Biography

I recall the gut-punch impact Studs Terkel’s book Working had on me when I read it as a teenager: I had never realized so many people actually worked in “menial” jobs, nor that there is dignity and self-respect in dong ANY job well. It meshed neatly with my understanding of …

Like Christopher Ricks, newly elected professor of poetry at Oxford, and the Warren Professor of Humanities at Boston University, who has a new book out on the subject that many might consider … granular: In a corner by the desk there is also a boom box. Mr. Ricks brings this …

Clinton book "campaign" begins

I voted for Bill Clinton twice and was happy to do so – he did a lot of things right (NAFTA, welfare reform, race relations) and was lucky as well (the economy). As we all know, it is better to be lucky than to be good. But by the time …

Walter Yetnikoff was a classic music industry player, until it all went wrong...

Clevelander Joe Eszterhas, Hollywood screenwriter more famous for being a dickhead than anything else, has a new memoir out about his complete change of life brought about by cancer of the larnyx, among other things. I’m glad he stopped smoking and drinking – good for him – but when the …

I hate Pete Rose – always have, probably always will. I hate the whole “Charlie Hustle,” “anything at any cost to win” crap. I hate the fact that he plowed into Ray Fosse and basically ruined his career in a freaking All Star game. I hate his selfishness and his …

Jessica Lynch has been lionized as a hero by the military, vilified as a fake by the rabid anti-war crowd – she has been bandied back and forth like a tennis ball. She is not a symbol, she is a person, she did not fight like Rambo when she was …

Today marks the 40th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where Martin Luther King Jr. and so many other great orators and civil rights leader spoke of the desire for true equality. I have been listening to NPR’s Tavis Smiley show the past few days as …

Caroll Spinney, Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch for 34 years, has written a book: The 156-page book (Villard, $16.95) is for adults, not children, but Spinney figures most of his readers will have grown up with Sesame Street, or have children who watch it. At 69, he says he …