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Jeffrey Frank’s The Columnist is a good read by
JULIET WATERS The Columnist, by Jeffrey Frank, came out in hardcover last year, but the recently-released paperback will probably feel more timely-at least for Canadians. If you’re wondering, during this Summer of Southam, what kind of journalist will be able to survive in the bosom of the Asper family, Sladder is it: he’s a backstabber, a sycophant and is trite to the point of absurdity. As one reviewer pointed out, Sladder is such a classic creation that his name should be part of the common usage, like “Scrooge” or “Uncle Tom.” A
“Sladder” would be the kind of journalist who would destroy
his own father’s career to get a scoop for his first job at The
Buffalo Vindicator, then do the same to his first girlfriend to get
a story about her congressman boss. Who would skip a party in his honour
for a photo op with John F. Kennedy. Who would essentially sleep and
ass-kiss his way into a syndication deal and network pundit spot. And
who would see nothing really wrong with secretly writing speeches for
a presidential candidate, then writing columns praising those speeches.
“The other day,” Sladder says to Hudnut, “I described Mrs. Thatcher as a surefooted shortstop who seems to be fielding line drives. The next day, you called her a third baseman fielding hard grounders, but the basic idea-” Hudnut cuts in: “There are only a few basic ideas out there, Brandon… you of all people should know that.” You may have guessed that Sladder’s specialty is the baseball metaphor. On the threat of Soviet expansionism in the early ’60s: “One should consider a baseball game when it is in the bottom of the ninth and the bases are loaded and the score is tied. Should one wait passively, hoping for a walk, or swing away?” On JFK’s assassination: “It is as if a great athlete has been cut down in his prime… As if Ted Williams was stopped in mid-swing. The game goes on-the demands of history assure that-but joylessly… The shocked crowd does not like the pinch hitter… We cannot boo because we know he did not enter the game on his own volition, yet we resent him.” Sladder’s odious writing is a large part of this satire, but it’s his odious personality that is Frank’s most notable creation. There’s something weirdly sympathetic about Sladder that makes it so easy to love hating him. Every awful move he makes is so thoroughly rationalized by his warped ego that he comes off as more ethically challenged than corrupt. He is genuinely hurt and shocked by the way in which he’s shunned by his peers, and the object of contempt for anyone who has a clue. And he gets his just desserts. Even if his career hadn’t been ruined by a scandal that rivals Lewinski-Clinton in its lame sleaziness, there are signs that Sladder was past his shelf life. Journalists who start their careers as young, right-wing schmoozers never last long. There’s always a younger, prettier face with a bow tie and a baseball metaphor. In this case it’s “the slow-witted and good-looking Cat Sturdy.” At least Sladder will always have his friends in high places. It’s on the advice of George Bush Sr. that he decides to write his autobiography. Bush believes that Sladder can “add considerably more than a footnote to a chronicle of our time.” If Sladder actually existed, this memoir would be like putting that footnote in his mouth. : The
Columnist by Jeffrey Frank. Harcourt, pb, 228pp, $21.50 |
