Seattlest: Seattle Marginalized Again by the New York Times

bigyaz

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 18:08:14 -0800

Wow. Talk about a total ass-kicking, Ronald. Hope Sorrentino has a delightful wine that goes well with the crow you had to choke down.

James Loftus

Sat, 12 Apr 2008 02:24:26 -0800

Wow, this has been fun! You don't seriously think that The New York Times 'has it in' for Seattle! There's two things about your tone: a touch of wounded pride (the Times editors don't have the time to read your posts, so they bring in some 'Hungarian Limey'!!); and some sort of overcompensation. Come on, Ronald. You actually seem to get a little vapory over seeing your little town up there in the big lights. The other possibility, of course, is that you're a 'spurned freelancer'. That's it, isn't it? Oh, the $2.50 mini-burgers piece you could have written. Well don't take it out on Raban. His writing on Seattle--both fiction and non-fiction--has been exemplary. He is easily one of the best writers in English working today. And when it comes to writing about place, without a doubt one of the best writers in any language over the last one hundred years. Jim in NY

ronaldholden

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 16:08:02 -0800

Impressive riposte, might I add. Humble apologies for the factual errors, Finno-Ugric aspersions, etc. Mr. Raban is welcome to stop by the bar at Sorrentino on Queen Anne any Friday or Saturday night for a glass or two on the house.

RonfromBeaconHill

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 15:08:29 -0800

knew i liked him too.

Katelyn

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:39:32 -0800

Fuck yeah. I knew I liked him.

Kim Ruehl

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 13:46:34 -0800

(posting this for Jonathan, because for some reason it wouldn't let him post it.) Aha! It's "Go home, limey, and mind your business" time on Seattlest today, I see. If you wanted to impugn me and my work, it might have helped your cause to get at least one fact right. No doubt to emphasise my alienness (and add a further disqualification to my entitlement to write about Seattle), you say that I am "Hungarian-born." Come again? I have no familial or other attachment to Hungary, a country I have never visited. Despite my rather odd-sounding second name, the Rabans came from the village of Penn in Staffordshire, England, where they were listed as farmers in 1570, when the earliest extant parish records began. No- speakee Finno-Ugric, I'm sad to say. It is apparently "fine" for me to publish a critical essay about Seattle in "a local blog like Crosscut." Only trouble is, that piece first appeared in the Financial Times, published in London and New York. Crosscut sought permission from the FT to post it on their site, and acknowledged its original source when they put it up. I have been writing about Seattle for nearly twenty years. The city figures prominently, not just in Waxwings and Surveillance, but in my books Hunting Mister Heartbreak, Bad Land (which won the National Book Critics Circle award and was, in paperback, on the New York Times bestseller list), Passage to Juneau, and my collection of post 9/11 essays, My Holy War. Your descriptions of both my NYT piece yesterday and Christina Rossetti's poem are travesties, as any reader who takes the trouble to seek them out will see for him/herself. By the way, the four pieces that I contributed to the series, for which I was invited to write by the NYT, were not "conflated vignettes of Seattle." The first was about the the land east of the Cascades, the second and third were about Forks, WA. Only the last was about Seattle. Which--on the basis of your description of Rossetti's poem--is a fair measure of your reading skills. Heigh ho. Peace and goodwill to all... >> Jonathan Raban

Chris V

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 21:20:11 -0800

Seattle is parochial?! Pah-lease! Nothing ever happens in Seattle. We are constantly forced to look out of our city when we turn on the news or other shows. All references to "Washington" refer to the DC, not the WA. If any place is parochial, it is New York City. I've never seen a larger group of navel-gazers as that bunch. Hell, half the shows on TV are based in New York. As far as they're concerned, it's not just the world that revolves around NYC, it's the entire freakin universe!

jessejb

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 12:06:42 -0800

@Troy haha Not to mention we're recruiting their police force now.

TroyJMorris

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 11:50:11 -0800

They're just pissed off we're stealing their best and brightest.

jessejb

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 11:41:20 -0800

Whatevs. They just don't want their populace to know that we have everything they secretly yearn for in a city.

ronaldholden

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 11:41:09 -0800

Not so much "taking offense" as being annoyed that lazy mainstream editors yet again relied on clichés. It's regrettable, paint-by-numbers journalism...unworthy of the NYTimes (fallen upon hard times) and condescending to its readers. Thank goodness for alternative voices (like Seattlest, like Slog).

Katelyn

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 10:06:05 -0800

I liked Raban's novels -- they DID catch something really important about the spirit of this city. (I didn't like the endings of either one, but I also don't need a novel to be perfect in order to enjoy it.) He wasn't a bad pick for the Seattle pieces in the NY Times. Seattle's always been given the monkey-in-the-zoo treatment from the East Coast, but who cares? We're a younger city, a younger culture, and NYC culture/media tends to look down its nose at everything as a matter of course. I don't take offense at it.

ronaldholden

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 09:47:21 -0800

What gets me, Ron-From-Beacon-Hill, is the way the NY Times gives Seattle the monkey-in-the-zoo treatment. Look! How quaint! They're behaving almost like people! Or the pet-dog treatment: it's almost as if he knows what we're talking about! Maddening, this is, and has nothing to do with Seattlites being parochial. Which they are.

RonfromBeaconHill

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 09:20:41 -0800

ah, come on now - you're much too sensitive Ronald. And you only confirm the opinion that Seattealites are parochial and, well, overly sensitive. I liked Raban's piece. Let him have his opinion. Who cares if it's given national exposure? I sure don't. Why would you care what the rest of the country thinks of Seattle ? I like it here, And I could care less what anyone thinks.