Janet Flanner's World: Uncollected Writings 1932 - 1975

Rating:
Summary: fascinating but uneven
Review: In some ways, history must be easier to write than journalism, because the historian knows what happened; he or she knows what to emphasize. Perhaps most of today's journalism will turn out to be irrelevant; perhaps we are all focussed on the wrong issues. How interesting then to read journalism from the past that seems so valuable. In this collection, dating from 1932 to 1975, Janet Flanner proves to be a brilliant observer of the events of her day. She was a well known writer for the New Yorker who spent many of these years in Europe. Her account of "Mrs Jeffries" escape from Paris in 1943 gives the reader a vivid and unusual picture of life in occupied and Vichy France.

In general, she seems to be better with descriptions of events, narrative, atmosphere, politics, than with descriptions of people. Her account of Thomas Mann is odd and her profiles of Hollywood people are also a bit jarring. On the other hand, her descriptions of Alice Toklas, Margaret Anderson, and Sylvia Beach are all excellent.