Russell BakerReseñas

Russell Baker has written a delightful story about growing up in America between the world wars.

Good life story of the early years of this reporter and writer.

4/19/22

This book has excellent descriptors and is well written.

It was better than I expected, but still pretty boring, especially the end of the book, as the author has finished college and is nearing marriage. The middle, giving examples of a single mother with 2 kids trying to make ends meet in the middle of the Depression has some interesting insights. The overall story seems rather disjointed, though. Is it a story about a domineering mother or a story of making it during the Depression or a story about a young man's coming-of-age?

I enjoyed the book until it reaches his time in the Navy. It became boring from that point until he marries.

It was very interesting to read Baker's memoir so soon after finishing Harry Crews' book. Both men born in the south, in the mod-1920s; both lost their fathers very soon and both somehow scrambled into college educations through seeming miracles; both served in the military and even took advantage of the GI Bill to go to college. The differences are also stunning: Baker's story is of a climb by his mother and other family members back into the middle class, a climb so successful that Baker became a respected columnist for the "good gray NY Times". Fittingly, his prose lacks the color and power of Crews' writing; although Baker is a gifted writer, he feels more restrained, more tame.

The Good Times is a sequel of sorts to Baker’s classic memoir Growing Up. This part of his life covers mainly his newpaper career at the Baltimore Sun and the New York Times. Baker’s writing is familar, friendly, but shows the craft he perfected over the years working deadlines. His introspection about his own failings encourages the rest of us. “Oh, Russell, make something of yourself” his mother would tell him. Even the two Pulitzer Prizes he won probably wouldn’t have been very impressive to her. The end of the book is a discussion of Baker’s nose to the grindstone work ethic and how it contrasts with his own children’s more laid back attitude toward life. At first it bothered him. Then he realized, his was a generational attitude, one that came with the sorrow of the Depression, one that he wouldn’t have wished on his children. This book, like all of Russell Baker’s books, is a gem and a pleasure to read.

Russell Baker was born in 1925 to a young poor couple in rural Virginia. His mother was a take-charge woman who unfortunately married a man who proved to be unreliable, and died at age 33 of undiagnosed diabetes combined with alcoholism. His mother left Virginia for Newark, NJ, taking Russell and his sister Doris, and leaving his youngest sister in the care of relatives. Russell was always encouraged by his mother to develop 'gumption,' and began selling newspapers at an early age. The book takes us from his childhood to the post-WWII era. Throughout his growing up, Russell is continually living with relatives and many interesting portraits come from these relationships. Eventually, through happenstance, Russell decides to throw caution to the wind, and applies to Johns Hopkins, even though he has no way of financing college. To his surprise, he is granted a 2-semester grant, and attends for one year, until he enrolls in the Navel Air Force. He completes his degree in English upon return, and moves into a career in journalism. This book won the Pulitzer Prize and I can understand why. Its honesty and detail portray an era in a way that is unforgettable.

Memoir that covers, roughly, the years from 1947 to 1962, when Baker was a reporter (at various levels) for the Baltimore Sun, later transitioning to the New York Times; the volume concludes when Baker was given the "Observer" column he later held for many years. There is a wealth of funny stories in the book, and Baker doesn't spare himself from being the butt of humour, though I did find his naif routine in the politics of the Times, when one of his colleagues was forced out, to be a little bit assumed. He also wears his poverty a bit like a hair-shirt at times, which means to me that he might have been rather difficult to deal with, in the chip-on-shoulder department. Still, I think this was better than the first volume (Growing Up), in that to a certain extent, Baker *did* grow up. Recommended.½

I read Russell Baker's GROWING UP 25 or 30 years ago, when it was still relatively new and had been on bestseller charts for a couple years or more. I picked up an old tattered copy of it at a library sale a few weeks back, knowing I'd already read it, but I remembered how much I loved it, so I couldn't just LEAVE it there in that pile of old books. Then this past weekend I thought I'd just peek into it, maybe skim a few chapters. Nope. Spent a couple days rereading the whole damn thing. And it was just as good this time as it was before, because Russell Baker's story is just so fascinating, so 'delicious' to read and read again. Baker's father died when he was only five, and his mother struggled to keep her family together, and managed to raise them in the midst of a large extended family of assorted and colorful uncles, aunts and cousins, as they moved from Virginia to New Jersey to Baltimore. Baker tells of his childhood, adolescence and time in the Navy toward the end of WWII, and then of his early years as a newspaperman with the Baltimore Sun, and his four-year courtship with Mimi, who he would finally marry. Baker went on to enjoy a very distinguished career as a reporter and columnist for the NY TIMES. The stories he tells here are so absorbing, so funny, so moving. He begins and ends with a portrait of his mother in her last years, her mind and memory failing, that will just tear your heart out.

What I found in rereading GROWING UP after nearly thirty years is that it's just as good - maybe even better, given my own graying head and advanced years - the second time around as it was the first time. I thought of a few other favorite memoirs I've revisited: Curtis Stadtfeld's FROM THE LAND AND BACK, Ron Jager's EIGHTY ACRES, and Curtis Harnack's WE HAVE ALL GONE AWAY. This one's right up there with those. I Googled Baker and I think he's still with us, 92 years old and retired in Virginia. Maybe I'll write him a letter. (Remember letters?). I love this book. Thank you, Mr. Baker. My highest recommendation.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER

Recommended by William Zinsser, in On Writing Well, p. 136.

1990: great in the Depression in the South talk was free - leisure of the depression - filled house morning till night + books
1996: P - Prize @ depression backwoods of VA — strong women

The saddest, funniest, most tragical yet comical picture of coming of age in the U.S.A. in the Depresson years and World War II that has ever been written.

1990: excellent story growing up + newspaper boy to reporter
1996: 2nd part growing up — ok — family interesting @ LBJ

Russell Baker rose steadily, from newsboy to college paper, from police reporter to rewrite man, from White House correspondent to Washington columnist. In outline these stages read like a successful resume, but it is Baker's recall of detail that make the story live. Nothing was easy. Success never is. Behind every triumph lies a pitfall, behind every joy a hard lesson. Baker tells it all from the mean streets of Baltimore to a seat at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, and from watching Ike fish to sharing LBJ's secrets.

This was a nice, readable, enjoyable account of Baker's early adulthood, with fun glimpses into the world of newspapers in the mid-twentieth century. Baker frames the story with discussion of his mother's ambition for him. She was always telling him he should make something of himself, and even when he achieved success he was urged to try for greater things. His drive led him to a successful newspaper career. He served in London and did a lot of Senate, White House, and campaign reporting before finally settling into life as a columnist, where he ends this portion of his story.

Baker provides wonderful descriptions of life in London, his interactions with famous people, and the workings of the print media. He also provides a bit of commentary on the differences between his generation's ambition and his children's less ambitious, more freewheeling attitudes. Although he initially bemoans his mother's constant pressure to succeed, he eventually comes to the conclusion that this work ethic is a better approach.

I liked this one and would recommend it to anyone who is interested in journalism, history, or just a good memoir.½

It was in the aftermath of the 2000 presidential election that I first, all unwitting, encountered the phenomenon of American political commentary in all its ugly reality. My image of the American political commentator was based largely on The West Wing and on Alistair Cooke, that doyen of reasoned and courteous intelligence. There was no clear presidential winner; so, fed up with the ignorance of the British media on the subject, I started to visit American websites for enlightenment. A media industry that had picked Jed Bartlet as their fictional President would be bound to have something profound and insightful to say on the situation… right?

Oh dear.

It was a rude awakening indeed. The strident bigotry… the certainty in the mind of every pundit, of every self-appointed online commentator, that they were right and the other guys were wrong and stupid… the playing to the gallery of extremists.

The great Mr Cooke made the point: ‘In my experience, a weary one that lasted through six days and evenings, there was not one man or woman of whom you could say: "I don't know which party he/she belongs to."’ He did not intend it as a compliment.

For the 2004 presidential election, my expat American wife decided for some reason that I needed to be kept away from the current generation of media mediocrats, and gave me a copy of ‘So This is Depravity’ - Russell Baker’s collection of essays, most of them reprinted from his regular column in The New York Times between 1973 and 1980.

Here was a commentator, an essayist, who could write of serious subjects without taking himself too seriously; who could, amazingly, write with wisdom, empathy and compassion in the midst of that grim period of enforced national self-awareness, when America had, for perhaps the first time in its history, messed up spectacularly and publicly both at home (Watergate) and abroad (Vietnam).

And slipped in between Baker’s wry, witty comment on current affairs and politics, the reverse to its obverse, is his humour. Whether in the catalogue of DIY disaster, “They Don’t Make That Anymore” (p. 94), his foray into culinary immortality, “Francs and Beans” (p. 132), or his account of reading Proust, “Crawling Up Everest” (p. 252 – but oh, for an index or a table of contents anywhere in this book!), Baker has a knack for taking some facet of everyday life and following it to its most absurd and yet logical conclusion – and making us laugh while he does it.

Nowadays Baker’s editor would tell him to be ashamed of his classical education, to hide it away in a filing cabinet, lest it embarrass or confuse some less erudite reader. Fortunately for literary posterity, neither that editor nor that reader had been born when Baker was coaxing “Caesar’s Puerile Wars” (p. 27) out of his Remington.

It is all a far cry from the world of blogs and Facebook, where any fool with an internet connection can spew forth his or her opinion without restraint, moderation or decorum. One longs for the wisdom of a Cooke or the wit of a Baker to make sense of the events of 2011, rather than a sub-culture of pundits and bloggers who rely so heavily on the language of hatred.

I do not 'do' the language of hatred. We each have enough to contend with in life without filling ourselves with hatred - particularly other people's hatred.

Freedom of speech is all very well. The trouble is that it’s too often used as an excuse – an excuse for hatred, for bigotry, for the sheer lazy stupidity of playing to one’s own extremist gallery. The enraged self-righteousness of the strident blogger doesn’t change anyone’s mind; it merely entrenches existing opinions pro or con.

The good news is that these characteristics, the bigotry and the smallness of mind, expose themselves. The other good news is that we can choose not to take part in this dreary, destructive trench warfare.

Russell Baker sets a benchmark for intelligent commentary on the awkward and the unpalatable. Those who wish to express their opinions on the circumstances of 2011 would be well advised to read him, to learn from his wise and good-humoured example, before they commit their views to the ether.

(A fuller version of this review appears at http://wp.me/p1u5Oe-1D)

This collection of Baker's NYT Observer columns range from the early 1960's to 1989, and covers the usual wide range of topics. Deliciously funny observations, many of which are profoundly serious beneath the banter. My, but I miss "The Observer".

A collection of short funny pieces by Russell Baker, most of which appeared in his "Observer" column in the New York Times. They range over many subjects, many of which reflect the foibles of current day America. Great fun to read, and reread.

This is a compilation of eleven book reviews Baker wrote for the New York Times. He writes of the inside politics of JFK, the mutual hatred of Bobby Kennedy and Lydon Johnson, LBJ's stubborn refusal to get out of Viet Nam, the manipulations of a very dangerous Herbert Hoover, the dangerous paranoia of Richard Nixon, the indecisiveness of Barry Goldwater and the life of the newspaper millionaire William Randolph Hearst.

The most striking chapter was the one regarding Martin Luther King, Jr. Calling him the best and the bravest, Baker states that King was "probably the one indisputable great American of the century's second half."

Recommended for those interested in a snap shot of American history.

This is a collection of Russell Baker's political columns from the 1970s. In my opinion, Baker is one of the greatest political humorists of the 20th Century. He doesn't seem to take one side or the other, but he skewers everyone indiscriminately, and his observations are spot on. Even though this collection is extremely dated (were the 70's really 30+ years ago?), I was surprised (and a little bit chagrined) to find out how little things have changed. Sometimes, it's a good idea to read dated history (particularly humor), just to remind ourselves that we are forever doomed to repeat history.

Russell Baker, a classy and erudite journalist, columnist and commentator, has put together a collection of expanded book reviews, around 4,000 words, about several icons of history. Sometimes he pits one author against another on the same subject. We have essays about William Randolph Hearst, Eugene Debs, the feud between LBJ and Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Joe DiMaggio, Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater and the death penalty. The books reviewed are intriguing, and Baker excels at picking the interesting nuggets to mull over.½

Excellent time piece, more insightful than a history. You get a glimpse of the nuances of life during the Great Depression, the hopes, dreams, shortfalls, and the disappointments that make up real life. i would highly recommend this book to anyone but especially to history buffs interested in America in the early to mid 20th century, not for its factual construction of the era but for its intimate details that are lost in between the facts.

Pulitzer Prize winning reporter talks about growing up in Baltimore MD in the 50'd; his first jobs as a reporter, and the famous people that he has covered.

2719 The Good Times, by Russell Baker (read 12 Mar 1995) I read this because of how much I appreciated Baker's superlative book, Growing Up, which I read 11 Apr 1986.. This book, The Good Times, covers his time in newspapering from when he was a paper boy to when he became a columnist for the New York Times in about 1961. It is a fascinating account, and I much admire Baker. For one thing, he is still married to the girl he first married and who only had a 10th grade education. His account of being in England when the Queen was crowned and his time as White House and Senate correspondent in the fifties and sixties are sheerly absorbing reading. The last paragraph, on his mother's death, is a classic. The man is a superlative journalist.

A terrific autobiography – even if you’ve never heard of journalist Russell Baker. His account of growing up in the 1930’s and 40’s is very funny, poignant, sometimes tragic, and honest. Baker avoids the easy sentimental route, and really brings to life personal and historic events. A Pulitzer Prize winner and a classic.