Magazine Lecture #4

The New Journalism

Gonzo Journalism = Performance, Observational and Literary

Performance Journalism (another way of describing the Gonzo concept) 
(all factual features are performance journalism) 

Most factual entertainment is all presenter led. Examples of these are chat shows are the TV version of confessional interviews i.e Jonathan Ross.

Solopcism in print journalism - using ‘I’. 

Rough lecture notes of the New Journalism (Wolfe and Thompson)
1960’s/70s - popular culture in the USA. Theres a generational change.

Anti-Vietnam war, anti-consumerism, feminism, black power, popular existentialism, rock music, the beatles, post-expressionism etc. Also 1968- Paris Events, LSD, Marajuana and Zen. The beat poets, the new left, alternative society. Prague spring etc.

Radical Chic and Mau-Mauing the flak-catchers - Tom Wolfe

Radical Chic - the black panthers at Leonard Bernstein’s penthouse residence on Park Avenue (Jan 1970) - two grand pianos, 13 rooms. New York magazine article ‘radical chic’. 

In Journalism - a literary movement - The New Journalism.

Main Point: Shift in form of narration from Diegetic to Mimetic

Plimton - Chicago Sun Times. Gonzo sport journalism. Wrote about the sport subjectively after spending some time with them. 

Seeing not telling.

Objectivity is junked in favour of subjective experience. 

Ultimate New Journalism piece is FEAR AND LOATHING - ‘Gonzo Journalism’ 

Impact of psychology and theories of subjectivity and truth (‘honestly’ and ‘authentic’ experience rather than boring old objective scientific truth). 

Ultimately ‘Performance Journalism’ e.g. SUPERSIZE ME. This appears to be heading towards ‘Roman Circus Journalism’ where the journalist is tortured and murdered live on TV, or possibly eaten alive by lions or crocodiles to get ratings.

But ‘Gonzo’ is now the default format for almost all TV journalism, and also for feature writing and magazine work.

This is an age which is dominated by visual images amid declining literacy.

Gonzo type documentary - fly on the wall

Tom Wolfe’s Rules
Use the convention of 19th and 20th century realist literature (especially Zola and Dickens, Steinbeck, Orwell. 

The four ‘tools’ for story telling in this way. (The New Journalism)
1. Scene by Scene construction (with jump cuts or punctuation)

1. Phonetic dialogue/actual speech (wild track)
2. Third person restricted point of view (no ‘I’ see, used ‘it is’)
3. Concentration on symbolic ‘status life’