Notes From A Master Teacher

In the final Communication 1 class at Penn State Lehigh Valley, my colleague and friend, Mr. Glenn Kranzley, a 42-year journalism veteran, shared the aspects of being a writer that he most enjoys.  I feel really lucky to have been in the class today.

The Best Things About Being a Writer

1.        Write to learn.

He said that when you write you not only use the information to share with your readers, you use it for yourself.  By writing about things you turn yourself into an expert, day after day, topic after topic. Glenn has observed that when journalists appear on Jeopardy! or Who Wants to Be a Millionaire they always do well because their careers enabled them to know and write about so many topics.

2.        Be interested.

To be a good writer you need to be interested in everything and nothing else.  Glenn urged students to keep energized and fresh, something he was reminded of recently as he worked on a history book he is writing.  Avoid the dangerous notion that just because you are experienced there is nothing new you can learn.  He believes that through the writing process he becomes open to new learning and he urged students to open themselves up to new learning throughout their careers.

3.         Be subversive. 

As a writer you have the power to get people to act or respond.  Glenn remembers a gruff newspaper editor he worked for who discovered in the course of reporting on a hospital  that some children admitted to the hospital did not have the most basic of needs such as clothing and other essential supplies.   Because of the reporter’s efforts a fund was established over forty years ago that still exists today.  It provides needy children with the necessities they would otherwise not have.   Writers have the power to be subversive in a positive way.

I know I’m not a student, but I certainly have learned a lot from Glenn Kranzley since he came to teach at Penn State Lehigh Valley.   I appreciate what he has done to make Comm 1, also known as the “State of the Valley” (please “like” us on Facebook)class such a worthwhile experience.  Thanks, Glenn!

Over-sharing or Worth the read? Elizabeth Edwards, Jenny Sanford and Dina Matos McGreevey

With the recent (and pathetically staged) “apology” of the allegedly sex-addicted Tiger Woods fresh in our minds, I read and re-read three books from spouses of politicians who have strayed.  This growing body of reading material begs the question:  “is it worth the paper it is printed on?”

            “My truth is I am a gay American.”   When I watched the governor of New Jersey declare this in August, 2004,  with his picture-perfect blond wife at his side, my only thought was, “And you had to stand next to him to further your humiliation because?”  In her 2007 book, Silent Partner, Dina Matos McGreevey explains why she stood by his side that day.  She explains that she stood by her husband because he asked her to be “Jackie Kennedy” that day. She could have refused.   The best compliment she has for her ex-husband in the book? “The sex was good.”  Throughout most of the book, however, the former first lady of New Jersey describes  her ex-husband as a self-important, pathological liar who said more   to the people of New Jersey than to her about his realization that he is gay.  That she was left for another man and not another woman is the “news hook”, I suppose about McGreevey’s book, but this book left me feeling sorry for all of them and hoping that by writing such a bitter tale, Dina Matos feels better.     Like the Jenny Sanford book, Staying True, McGreevey’s book is full of bitterness over slights that at the time seemed a little weird,  but in retrospect were pointing to a big problem in the marriage. 

 So it was a relief when Jenny Sanford didn’t subject herself to the same media glare when her governor husband gushed like a school boy and rambled on about crying with his soul mate in Argentina.  In June, 2009, when Mark Sanford, governor of South Carolina made his stream of conscience confessional, it was good that he stood alone.  The first lady’s absence showed certain defiance.   But now Jenny Sanford is telling everyone how she is “staying true” in her tell-all book by the same name.   Besides the obvious financial gains of writing a best-selling book, what good can come of her over-sharing about the kinds of things better left for pillow-talk?

Now I am all for expanding women’s voices.  I live for it.  But what is gained by information like this? As a mother I cringe for her four sons.  They should come to their own conclusions about their father.   And Jenny Sanford no doubt could spend her considerable talent and energy doing something of greater import.

 I picture a glint in the eye of Jenny Sanford as she describes events that would better be left between the two of them.  Do we need to know about  how the governor returned a favorite diamond necklace  because he regretted spending as much as he did on it or how he left her alone while she underwent a tubal ligation to avoid the danger of a fifth pregnancy? The portrait of Mark Sanford that emerges from this book is one of a narcissistic lightweight woefully lacking in the sensitivity department.   I already sensed as much without reading one page. 

Who could not admire Elizabeth Edwards?  Mother of a dead teenager, cancer patient and political spouse; each role a burden.   But when word of her husband’s unfaithfulness hit the news, I wondered why thoughtful and intelligent Elizabeth Edwards would dignify it with a book.  Until I read it. 

Additionally, when the new book Game Change characterized the (soon to be former) wife of John Edwards as “an abusive, intrusive, paranoid, condescending everywoman” I had to get my hands on that book to read the whole incriminating excerpt.   That book is too salacious for my taste, but back to the book review at hand.

Resilience is not what I expected, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.    When I teach communication at Penn State, I tell my students that the “rhetorical situation” is any set of circumstances that invites an utterance or writing that aims to influence others.  I’m influenced, indeed, by Elizabeth Edwards.

Political spouses are especially interesting to me, since they are, in most cases, thrust into the spotlight as surrogates to their spouse-candidate.  If John Edwards never ran for political office, it is most unlikely that we would have ever heard of Elizabeth Edwards.    After reading Resilience I come away with this perception of Elizabeth Edwards in particular and the perception of political spouses in our country in general.

 The book is unique because unlike other books in the ‘wronged’ political wife genre (the category is getting thick), this book is most reflective, sad and inspiring.  Clearly the stake in Elizabeth Edwards’s heart was the untimely death of her first born son, Wade and not so much the intrusion of Rielle Hunter into her marriage.  She painstakingly recounts the car accident that lead to his death (dishes survived the crash, but he died; she looked for him everywhere after his death, including drawers) and as a mother I want to embrace her (and my teenage son) because she poignantly writes of the fortitude needed to continue after so great a loss.  Her husband’s infidelity, though a tragedy all its own, is reduced to the seduction from a young upstart who told the then-candidate, “You’re so hot.” 

The image of political spouses that the press and books like Game Change would have us hold onto is one dimensional.  These “first ladies in waiting” as I like to call them are either super-nice and pretty or the b word and ugly or fat.   I have no doubt that Elizabeth Edwards was at times difficult on the campaign trail.  Put any one of us out of our comfort zone of hearth, home and regular routine and you will be surprised how quickly we would unravel.    Like most of the women I know, the Elizabeth Edwards that emerges from her own writing  is smart, sad, trying to be strong, loving, and in desperate need to share her side of the story.  Of particular value to parents of children who have died are the coping strategies revealed in the book Resilience.  In this book she shares the most private, personal pain a person could possibly endure.

Besides the sobering lessons in Edwards’s book is that sad reality that most of the time the American press and public prefers a dumbed-down version of the political spouse.     The media wants not even sound bites from our political spouses, but “picture bites” usually of Barbie-doll like perfection, demure, uncomplicated and ultimately quiet.    If they don’t match that picture, they are characterized as the opposite:   shrill and unacceptable.  Elizabeth Edwards is a one-time political spouse, but more than that, I believe by telling her stories in two books (her first book Saving Graces is more concentrated on the loss of her son than being stalwart in general) she has inched forward the stagnant image of the political spouse in a way that not even Hillary Clinton has done.     Elizabeth Edwards isn’t running for anything and is unlikely to have a public future.  In a quiet, dignified way she has told her story.    From her story of heart-wrenching pain and pleasure, a complete person emerges, defying the usual stereotype of one-dimensional political spouses. I am indifferent about former political candidate John Edwards and I predict his story will quickly recede from public interest.   McGreevey’s book and Sanford’s book are too bitter to be enjoyed and offer few, if any, lessons. Elizabeth Edwards, however has made a lasting impression on me and a contribution to reading with her thoughtful, open-hearted book,  Resilience.

Nichola D. Gutgold is author of several books on women’s communication styles.  http://www.nicholagutgold.com

Teaching Inspires

One of the most difficult aspects of being a writer is coming up with new ideas for projects.  I’m  fascinated about where writers find ideas.  I often reflect back with great enjoyment when I think about where I got some  ideas that turned into chapters, articles or books.  In today’s Philadelphia Inquirer, the author of Girl With The Pearl Earring, Tracy Chevalier, notes that when she saw the Vermeer painting in 1997 she just had to write about the girl peering out.   Truman Capote came up with his book In Cold Blood from reading about the killings in The New York Times.

When we actually try to come up with new ideas, often nothing happens.  That’s why I tell students:  read (reading a daily newspaper is required for the course), write, see, travel, do. In short:  experience as much as you can and be opportunistic about any good ideas that come to you.  

Today, while I was teaching students about the rhetorical situation, an idea about a new writing project popped into my mind.  I’ve taught now for more than twenty years and my students are now about the age of my son. 

It is almost impossible to look into my classroom filled with so much youthful promise and not get inspired. 

Nichola D. Gutgold is associate professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State Lehigh Valley and author of three books:  Paving the Way for Madam President (2006);  Seen and Heard:  The Women of Television News (2008) and Almost Madam President:  Why Hillary Clinton ‘won’ in 2008 (2009).