What I Read: Pioneer Girl

I read a few of the Little House books when I was younger. The copies were my sister’s, with yellowed pages and at least one was missing the cover. A couple of years ago during a long Virginia winter, I read the entire series. It made winter in NoVa not seem so bad.

Pioneer Girl the autobiography by Laura Ingalls Wilder was published late last year. It’s the book that the fictional Little House series was based on. Pioneer Girl is an easy read, especially if you are familiar with LIW. It’s surprising how closely the fictional books follow the autobiography, but the autobiography is a wee bit gritter and contains descriptions of a less than ideal life (I mean, a house in the woods is pretty ideal).

Pioneer Girl

First of all, Pa sells Jack (!!!!) when he sold a set of horses. Pa would never do that. Michael Landon would really never do that. Laura’s doll is not named Charlotte. Ma had a baby boy, who died as an infant. Laura had some pretty not nice things happen when she was a schoolteacher. Ma is a bigger influence on Laura — possibly even bigger than Pa.

I recommend Pioneer Girl if you can get your hands on it. The book itself is set up really well, with the text in the main portion of the page and the annotations running along the text. It is also nice to put faces with names of minor characters along with fact-checking LIW’s memory. I really enjoyed the research that went into this — the census records and newspaper archives. All in all, a really lovely book.

Bob Simon

My very short Bob Simon story.

My sister, who works in education, took a job in Qatar at an American university. Like any mother would be, my mother was worried. Sure, Amy had been to Doha before and had friends their. Still, mothers are going to mother.

I knew that part of my mother’s fear was just not being informed about Qatar. It seemed like a very strange land to someone who rarely traveled outside the South.

In a discussion about trying to find good information that I could send along to her, Wally brought up that Simon had done a piece on Qatar in 2012. I remembered it, rewatched it and sent it to Mom.

While I won’t say the piece calmed all her fears, Mom did tell me how Qatar seemed like a pretty ok place.  If Bob went there — in a non-war correspondent capacity — Qatar might just be alright (I think it helped that in the intro, Simon says there had been no protests or demonstrations).

Journalism is about helping people understand what they do not know. Other lands, other people. Bob Simon was one of the greats at doing that.

What I Read: Susan Sontag

I read Susan Sontag’s Regarding the Pain of Others after seeing it on David Carr’s syllabus (Poynter). Since I’m taking another break from Gone With The Wind (I just got through Pa’s funeral and I’m not sure I’m ready for the Klan part), it was a pretty easy read.

Sontag’s idea about how moving pictures has become the norm, and that still photos are what get imprinted on our brains. I’ve noticed over the last couple of years that the networks use a lot more still photos (although they are zooming in and out) and steady shots when covering stories, especially regarding foreign policy.

“The photograph is like a quotation, or a maxim or proverb.” (p. 22)

Do I think that photography/stills are the most potent medium? I don’t know. I’m personally partial to television which I think exemplifies the Paris Match slogan of “the weight of words, the shock of photos.” (23) For me, there is more connection, more emotion flowing through that medium.

I thought it was interesting how she pointed out that most of the horribly injured people you see in photographs are from Asia or Africa. I would like to see more detailed numbers on this as I’m still unable to get footage of Ukrainian dead out of my mind and I’ve got the Sunday Post‘s A8 next to me with an AP file photo of a injured Marine in Beirut.  That does ring true to her later statement that people remember photographs not paragraphs.

Overall, Regarding the Pain of Others really made me think about the photographs I see on a daily basis. It also made me remember that sometimes you have to allow your memory to be a file system of images. It’s hard sometimes because you see so many faces and places flash by every day. It’s good to stop for a moment and let the images do their work.

“The images say: This is what human beings are capable of doing–may volunteer to do, enthusiastically, self-righteously. Don’t forget.” (115)