And So It Goes…..

UPDATE: In keeping with the theme of this original post, Commenter Woody asked me to name my favorite books. in the comments section, I babbled out a string of the first that came to mind. Now what about the rest of you? What books have changed you? What books have you loved? Which have brought you knowledge? Comfort? Delight?

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My very smart, soulful friend, David Ulin, Editor of the LA Times Book Review,
and all-’round cool and excellent Man of Letters, has written a lovely “appreciation” for Vonnegut in Friday’s LA Times. Here’s how it opens:

“FOR readers of a certain age and philosophical bent — and I count myself among them — Kurt Vonnegut was the writer who opened up the world. There was your life before Vonnegut, and then there was Vonnegut. Once you read him, it changed everything.”

As I read David’s description of how much Vonnegut’s work mattered to him, I thought (as probably many of you will reading this) of the various books that have changed my life, made me see the world differently, steadied me during strange times, made me laugh (and sob) like crazy, given me solace—-or sometimes just company—at moments when I needed that sort of psychic ballast terribly.

THEN after that first nice thought…..I had another far less happy thought about books.

I remembered that the Los Angeles Times—or more properly the Tribune Co.—has recently elected to slash the paper’s Sunday Book Review section and then to graft it (upside down, no less) on to the Sunday opinion section (“Current,” as it is called these days) as if the book review was some sort of grotesque extra leg.

The first Frankensteinian Book-Op will appear this coming Sunday.

The move is being made to cut costs, of course. (The book review and the opinion sections have few and no ads, respectively, thus aren’t big profit centers.) It doesn’t seem to matter that the Los Angeles Times as a whole is running at a 20 percent profit—which is considered a cheer-inducing yearly bottom line in many industries.

But as Charles Bobrinskoy, the VP of Ariel Capital Management (one of Tribune Co’s largest stock holders), said in an interview with Frontline earlier this year: “It’s not the profit margin that counts; it’s the direction of profits.” And the Times’ profit is merely holding steady, not gaining at a rapid clip.

The horror.

The fact that profits ARE holding steady during this brave new period when all print media is struggling for redefinition (and, in many cases, existence), says something good about the LA Times and its potential for future growth—at least, if it can hold on to its old strengths while acquiring some savvy and innovative, web-based new ones.

(NOTE TO TRIB CO PEOPLE: “Innovative” does not mean stunt journalism—like having Brian Glazer or Donald Rumsfeld edit your Sunday opinion section.)

But short-sighted, greedy fools, who live in cities other than our own, believe they know what’s best for us poor, clueless Los Angeles folks.

(“[Los Angeles] readers care about the local entertainment industry,” opined the same far-seeing Mr. Bobrinskoy to Frontline.)

Well, of course. How silly of us to think otherwise.

The real truth is that those out-of-towners don’t believe we read all that much anyway—entertainment news or otherwise. So, since neither the book review nor the opinion sections feature many, you know, photos–hell,why not just combine ’em. Otherwise, all the uninterrupted strings of words might make the LaLa Landers nervous.

Or something.

The whole matter feels particularly ironic in that, weekend after next, the paper will host its 12th annual Los Angeles Festival of Books—which also happens to be the largest book festival in the freaking country. Bigger than New York’s. Bigger than San Francisco’s.

During that glorious two-day period 130,000 or so Angelenos of all ages, ethnicities and socioeconomic backgrounds will show up at the UCLA campus for no other reason than to celebrate….books, and reading. (If you’ve never been, please, please take my word for it and go. I walk around the entire time grinning like a hyena, just because it’s so damned fabulous.)

But, hey, why would our local paper need its own free-standing books section.

Maybe things will get better when the new guy, Sam Zell, takes over as primary corporate shot caller for the company. I don’t know.

IN THE INTERIM, A CONSTRUCTIVE SUGGESTION:: the next time the front office guys—either here or in Chicago—decide to make a decision that affects the paper and its subscribers, it might be a nice idea to ask for the opinions of some of the people who read it, or even, God forbid, write for it.

But they probably won’t.

As Kurt Vonnegut once described the issue at hand, “The feeling persists that no one can simultaneously be a respectable writer and understand how a refrigerator works.”

Or a newspaper.

PS: And, yes, this is a social justice issue.