COURSE AIMS:

Course Description

An opinion piece is everything solid journalism requires from any other form of reporting: good investigative skills, sharp judgment, a firm, eloquent writing style, a clear presentation of hard, grounded facts, and excellent grammar.  It is, however, different from classical journalism in 3 important ways.

  Opinion pieces can take all sorts of forms: political stances; restaurant-theater-book- music or TV reviews, critiques (pro and con) of medical, governmental or financial systems.  These are often called OP-ED articles, because in print journalism they are generally presented on the page opposite those editorials that reflect the views of the publisher (who is usually conservative!).

  Opinion articles are short. Maybe 500 to 750 words. They therefore have to be expressions of quiet lucidity. The writer must get to the point pretty damn quickly. And damn clearly. There’s just no room to dither.

 The opinion article is allowed and even required – as no front-page story ever is – to present what journalists call a slant: an unabashed opinion, in other words. And that opinion is the result of earnest thought and a probing examination of the facts. It’s fine to have an opinion, in other words, but it better be backed up.

This is a class that tells you, the writer, how to marshal those thoughts, those facts and come quickly to a clear and beautifully expressed opinion – one that might very well end up swaying the views of a lot of readers or viewers or listeners you don’t know and will likely never meet. (The highest compliment for any journalist!)  It will also teach you how to write – in a range of ways that differ markedly – for a wide assortment of media: the kind that is absorbed by the eye, as well as the kind that is interpreted by the ear.

SUMMARY OF COURSE CONTENT:

Part 1: We are going to begin with traditional media: writing sharp-edged political opinions and film-music-book-restaurant reviews for print. The political issues on which you will be asked to express your views will depend very much, as journalism always does, on the crises of the hour: thus, on certain days students will all be opining, each in his own particular way, on the very same issue. The reviews, on the other hand, will be up to you, the individual student, to select: but the professor’s consent must be obtained beforehand on whatever it is the student wishes to critique. 

    Always remember that the reader of magazines and newspapers is likely to be in a slightly more patient frame of mind than those who call up information on the Web. That’s why print op-ed pieces and film or book reviews may be longer than those you see on the Internet. Sentences can ramble on for just a little bit in print, adjectives are welcome. Commas and semi-colons are perfectly fine because the eye does like to dance around a printed page, as long as it has a fair chance of eventually being rewarded with a period. Or a new paragraph.

     These opinion pieces will be read out loud in class – and often edited, first by me, the professor, and then, as time goes on, by your peers. Thus, you will all learn not only how to be fine writers but good editors: supervisors who will learn how to tell when there’s a hole (as we say in journalism) in the story, an absence of back-up, a void.

Part 2: The second leg of the course will be writing similar reviews and political commentary for the Internet: blogging smart, in other words – a sorely needed addition to the Web these days.  The Internet user, even the one who calls up the New York Times every morning, has less patience, and wants news and views to be compact and full of impact, often enlivened with photos or better still, video footage. Writing here is still primary, however. And writing style is even more important here than in print: if you’re witty, charming, profound, mean-spirited, and brilliant – you’ll get a lot of people following you on the Web.

  Part 3: The last chapter of our course will be opinion writing for television and radio, a wholly different discipline from either of the others, and one that demands a whole new set of skills. Among them: brevity, simple, clear sentences, words of two syllables (at the outside), and complete subordination of copy to visuals. I spent 6 years on television, both writing and delivering film reviews on air 3 days a week and I can tell you that there’s nothing more annoying to anyone sitting in front of a camera than stumbling over long words or sentences with complicated subordinate clauses. It takes time to get used to this discipline, one that allows the speaker to “punch her copy” (as they say in the business), but eventually anyone can learn how to do it.

    Students will be asked to deliver TV-style political opinion pieces and film-book-music reviews to the rest of the class: this exercise will involve not only cogent writing, but also a clear delivery: punching up certain words, and modulating the delivery of others, depending on what portion of the copy you wish to emphasize..

   Yes, you can be smart on TV using words of 2 syllables, and you can be dazzling while invoking simple sentences. In fact, on television and on radio, simplicity is the only way of dazzling an audience – and simplicity, curiously enough, is the most difficult of all lessons to learn. 

    And finally, but extremely important, I will expect you all to write and email me – twice weekly – a journal of thoughts and opinions: on anything at all. It can be as little as 4 sentences or as long as you like, but writing is a muscle: the more you flex it, the better it gets!

1)      FIRST 2 WEEKS: WHAT YOU CAN AND CANNOT WRITE AND SAY.

 LIBEL LAW,  SLANDER, JOURNALISTIC ETHICS AND COMMON SENSE

We shall review famous cases of  libel and slander suits: the historic case of John Peter Zenger, which eventually gave rise to the First Amendment to the Constitution,  the New York Times vs. Sullivan (the most important  libel law precedent ever, and the precursor to all sorts of additional license granted the media) freedoms ; .writer Mary McCarthy vs. Lillian Hellman; Roman Polanski vs. Vanity Fair magazine (or libel law in the UK – a whole different kettle of fish, and one that can have serious repercussions for any American writer and that writer’s bank account!);  novelist Jeffrey Archer vs. anyone who writes anything about him. Also included is the circumstances in which you shouldn’t ever accept an assignment, no matter how tempting: personal bias, internal knowledge, close friendship, etc.

2)      The modern history of op-ed writers, from longwinded and pompous to crisp, acute and relatively short. Who they are. What they used to say and write. What we now say or write.  Walter Lippmann, James Russell, Maureen Dowd, Nora Ephron.

3)      How women opinion writers revolutionized the field:  their new subjects and their novel way of phrasing: Robin Givhan, Ephron, the late New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael.

4)      Critics, reviewers, how they write, how they think, and what they write about:  food critic Ruth Reichl, film critic Kenneth Turan of the LA Times and National Public Radio, TV critic Tom Shales of the Washington Post, Australian art critic Robert Hughes.

5)      Writing opinions for TV:  how to do it. Classroom explanation. Then writing (no more than 3 minutes long). Then delivery

6)      Punching your copy. What it means in both TV and radio, and how to do it.

7)      In front of the camera: or, the medium is unforgiving, and the message can get lost if you’re not careful. Discarding the inessential: excess language, excess invective, excess everything (jewelry, scarves, facial expressions, hand gestures).  We will examine and critique each student’s copy, delivery, and presentation.

8)      Writing for the Internet: how is it the same? How is it different from newspaper and magazine writing? Cf: Washington Post and NY Times web sites.

9)      How to write for Web aggregate sites: The Huffington Post and the Daily Beast. What makes them successful? What makes them crowded and difficult to navigate? How to write for either or both.

10)    The impertinent and investigative sites: Jezebel, The Smoking Gun, TMZ, TPM Muckraker – how to write for them: different strokes for different folks.