Washington Post wins 6 Pulitzers

If you wrote the Joshua Bell story at a weekly, it would be because no one at a larger enterprise had noticed your brilliance earlier. It wouldn't happen for two reasons: 1) Because you would have been found by some discerning editor years before you were capable of writing such an extraordinary piece; 2) Because you would have been offered enough cash and canvas to move up.
The Washington Post does not win six Pulitzers because of its cachet. It wins them because it has the resources and the taste to attract, discover and nurture exceptional, industrious, creative and competitive people. (Which probably explains the form letter they sent me when I dared to apply coming out of college.)

 

On violin: not that this is, in itself, proof of anything, but it was the most-emailed story on the Post's website for three-ish days after it originally came out; it's been the most-emailed, again, for the three days after it won the Pulitzer. Pretty amazing. Washington's a place of elites, but it's not like the story's appealed to art snobs alone.

 

I haven't weighed in on the current debate, but will now - if only because it gives me a chance to agree wholeheartedly with both Fenian and Jones, while simultaneously disagreeing completely with both Fenian and Jones.

Without regard to the prize under discussion, I'd say this: It's an absolutely brilliant piece of writing that proceeds from a profoundly flawed premise. So while I agree with Fenian that the foundation on which the piece rests is no sounder ethically, morally, aesthetically or practically than a segment on Punk'd or Candid Camera, like The Jones I also have to praise Weingarten's bravura performance in his rendering of the piece that rises from it.

There's absolutely no denying how talented a writer Mr. Weingarten is. Nor, to me, is there any argument available to refute how narrow a prank this piece rests on.

In that way, the whole thing's a little like listening to Itzhak Perlman (by far the better violinist) performing Turkey in the Straw. There's no contesting the remarkable enjoyment of it, but there's also no arguing that it means much of anything.

 

My feelings exactly. With such a gimmicky premise it was one of the better pieces I have read. Brilliant writing.

And this wouldn't work at any old daily. First off, no Josh Bell, story doesn't work without him.It had to be a famous musician. Second off, not many news organizations have the credibility to pull this off. That makes it a bit tainted.

What if Weingarten wrote this with a pen name for a local magazine? Never would have saw the light of day, and no one would have noticed if it was printed anyhow.

If the story informed us of anything is that forum matters. This would haven't won a Pulitzer Prize if done at an Alt weekly.

Why?

Because out of context and expectation even genius won't be noticed.

Brilliant piece.

 

If this same story was done at USA Today, it would not have won the Pulitzer, but it would have made a nice, colorful chart.

 

"We're Ignoring More Violinists These Days"

 

Who's a better fiddler? Nero, Charlie Daniels or Josh Bell?

 

Sometimes, I wish I read USA Today just so I could make USA Today jokes.

 

("He converted to Judaism purely for the jokes!")

 

The sports section can be useful. Otherwise, you're not missing much.

 

The Weingarten piece is beyond amazing. I thought he pulled off a lot of what Jon Carroll does at the SF Chronicle on an almost daily basis, write something intelligent that demonstrates the writer's brilliance, yet doesn't make the reader feel dumb.

Just because a piece is about a famous violinist doesn't make it snobbery. The experiment was to see whether people are too busy and rushed in their daily lives to recognize or appreciate beauty. My take was the overall experiment wasn't to see who would recognize Bell, he just mentioned how many had recognized him because it was an interesting nugget.

Whether people should be excused for being nearly late to work, doesn't change the premise. That's his point, that we're late to work in the first place, two working parents rushing to get the kids to pre-pre-school and trying to sleep as late as possible because we're up late finishing the T.P.S. reports to get that 5% raise next year.

The fact that more Americans recognize Ashton Kutcher than Bell is in itself commentary on the state of society, but I think you're reading into it to think that was Weingarten's central point, or that he's calling commuters rubes. He even makes a point to interview the art curator, or whomever it was, who explains how important context is to the situation.

I also think it's cool when a writer goes outside his or her norm and does something different. The guy's a humor columnist who obviously has chops beyond 99.8% of writers out there. Dave Barry's features always made me smile just because I think a lot of people assumed he couldn't do anything but fart jokes and had been born with a silly gift that was below journalism, one that he didn't have to work at.

It's the same crap sportswriters have to deal with when a city editor is shocked that they can write an A-1 piece in complete sentences.

 

I'm not sure if you've heard, but Weingarten's next piece finds him recruiting noted con artist Jimmy "The Bean" Belks to run a game of Three-Card Monte just outside the Kennedy Center the next time Anna Nebretko's in town.

The tag line:<i> Anna or the Queen of Hearts - which lady do they follow?</i>