Good Essay About “Yours In Truth: A Personal Portrait Of Ben Bradlee” By Jeff Himmelman

Concerning the key goal of this paper, it is mainly about summarizing the book “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee” by Jeff Himmelman; moreover, the paper argues that the abovementioned book is obviously worth reading due to many reasons. The thing is that the way Jeff Himmelman describes the career of Ben Bradlee, the former editor of Washington Post, enables the readers to come to understanding a variety of peculiar Bradlee’s special features from another angle. Moreover, the author makes attempt to eradicate the principles of commonplace thinking among ordinary people. As a result, a shift of focus from thoughtless accepting the truth to critical analyzing the matter occurs as the fundamental challenge of Jeff Himmelman’s book.
Speaking about Ben Bradlee, it is worth saying that, in accordance with many people who used to work with him, this personality was obviously not the icon within the field of journalism. Nevertheless, a number of drawbacks that the former executive editor of Washington Post possessed did not prevent him from obtaining absolutely unique personal charisma. Obviously, Ben Bradlee had a lot of fans; one of them was Jeff Himmelman, a journalist who managed to portray the main hero of his book in a way that breaks all the previous stereotypes.
Actually, the discussion book appears to have a disillusioned arc of close negotiations. As for Himmelman, he is focused in his book on uncovering the realistic image of Ben Bradlee; he is targeted on distinguishing all the weaknesses that a public figure of high rank is likely to suffer from. Unlike the previous articles communicating the excellent performance of Ben Bradlee, Jeff Himmelman decided to figure out the negative sides of this hero. Analyzing the book, it becomes apparent that the author is willing to convince the readers of the need to rethink the attitude towards the heroic legends characteristic of many famous people, including Ben Bradlee. The author portrays his own relationship with Bradlee and the layers of new details regarding a vividly imperfect journalistic career. Moving through the text, the readers are likely to collide with a variety of secrets unavailable to general public before; consequently, this very aspect makes this book obviously worthy of notice, since it guarantees the tension while reading it.
Despite the fact that the book “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee” was initially much criticized and considered as poorly-organized, Jeff Himmelman still managed to demonstrate completely another dimension of ordinary things. While reading the book, it is possible to undergo the peculiarities of the portrayed bond between Katherine Graham and Ben Bradlee. The thing is that their relationship was extremely needed for both of them. Katherine Graham was the Post publisher and proved to be the matter of great importance for Ben Bradlee. The excetuive editor wrote to Katherine describing her as the “ the most important force in my life.” It is important to make mention that, in accordance with many people, Ben Bradlee was in love with Katherine Graham. Even Bradlee’s wife, Sally Quinn considered Katherine Graham “ as a very welcome third person in our marriage.” All in all, it is necessary to admit that Ben Bradlee did have physical affairs with Katherine; he mentioned it while having an interview with Jeff Himmelman. The former executive editor specified the issue concerning the relationship with Post publisher and considered it as quite a fruitful cooperation; furthermore, he mentioned that there were many rumors about their affairs. All in all, the information did not correspond to reality. Speaking about the discussion book, it is worth saying that one should definitely read it, since it incorporates many unknown facts from Bradlee’s life.
Reading the book “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee”, it becomes clear that one of the most important rules of journalistic ethics is to follow the facts. The journalist can build his material only on the facts. Of course, the author can analyze, make hypotheses, but the article should be based on facts. Consequently, the journalist is not allowed to give his own opinion, if he can not supply it with facts. These are the rules to obey once you are willing to become a successful journalist. Moving through Himmelman’s book, the readers are likely to become aware that the journalist must represent the interests of the readers and the newspaper; it is about about the journalists deciding if the public needs this information. What is more, the journalist should be sure that the information in his/her article will be correctly understood by the public. This side of the journalist work is rather complicated, because the interpretation of the event is not only connected with the universal, but also with group values and ideals. That is the reason why journalists must clearly understand their audience, principals of their moral and ethical behavior.
The discussion book is worth considering, since it helps the readers understand that working on the article, the journalist should search for the truth. It means that if in the process of collecting material the journalist finds facts that are contrary to his hypothesis, the journalist should reject this point of view, even if might seem to be true at the beginning. What is more, journalists should always correct their mistakes. If a journalist made mistake, misrepresented facts, he has to write about it, and restore the truth. Moreover, the journalist should be very careful when selecting snapshots, or audio, video tapes of the total data in order not to distort the meaning and the nature of the received information, and to reveal it to the audience as fully as possible in his publications. Real journalist can not write a half-truth and to ignore the other half. Similarly, the journalist should not embellish the truth.
Another rule for the real journalist is that he can not obtain information under false pretenses. There are two types of contacts with a source of information. One type involves the “open” nature of the meeting. It means that the journalist is presented to the source as an official employee of the media. Another type is “hidden” with hidden cameras, microphones. In this case the journalist hides the true intentions and profession, or when the source does not know about his presence. This type can be used only if journalists need to witness the “undisturbed” life, to see it from the “inside”, or when journalists need to get information about the carefully hidden aspects of life, secret operations stored in the secret documents. However, in this case, the information received from the misguided companion is usually used only as a clue for further work and not as proven facts (except documents).
Considering the book “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee”, one cannot but encounter the fact that it represents the barefaced nature of journalism on the basis of Bradlee’s career. Looking into the entity of Bradlee’s image that Jeff Himmelman created, it is clear that Ben Bradlee has made an essential contribution to American journalism in general. His distinctive style is characterized by his original writing techniques like understatement and economy of the text.
Himmelman’s style is simple and straightforward. The language of the book is not burdened by verbose phrases. This can be explained by the fact that the story is written in the form of confession. A person cannot confess choosing “refined” words. The narrator shares his memories, which are presented chaotically. Abrupt beginnings and transitions, insertions of the man’s asking for more beer indicate that the speaker is sometimes tense and nervous. The reader gets the impression that these thoughts are circling in his head and make him suffer.
Analyzing Himmelman’s work, one should be aware that it covers the span Bradlee’s professional activity, incorporating the story about the high of Watergate; the author managed to draw attention to a real journalistic drama that many could hardly eyewitness before. The complexity of Bradlee’s life as well as the relationship with JFK and Bob Woodward prove this man to have a global awareness of journalism. Jeff Himmelman had a chance to cooperate with Ben Bradlee, and consequently, decided to write a book telling absolutely another story; his book emerges as the tool that breaks the sense of understanding Ben Bradlee. There is a number of curious things and different surprises that make the discussion book a real monitor of Bradlee’s personal life.
The book “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee” by Jeff Himmelman seems to be useful and interesting for both the ordinary people and also specialists, who work in this particular sphere. Furthermore, this book represents rather controversial way of analyzing the main hero. Speaking about why it is necessary to read Himmelman’s work, one should take into account the fact that this book is likely to catch attention by the real story of an executive editor Ben Bradlee. It is obvious that “Yours in Truth: a Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee” by Jeff Himmelman will definitely help not only in professional journalistic practice but also in ordinary personal life. This book inspired me on the new perception of many things. The book is not hard to comprehend for a typical student not familiar with journalistic activity. It means that the book does not require certain knowledge within this sphere in order to allow a reader to clearly figure out the key message of the text. Despite the fact it includes some sophisticated passages of text, the reader is still not obliged to be good at journalism. Consequently, it does not lessen the circle of all people willing to start reading the current book.
Therefore, the book should be a compulsory source for all to read. Secondly, the book is truly absorbing and easy to follow. The contemplation upon the ups and downs of the famous people gives the chance to fully disclose all the outlines of successful career. A new approach to understanding the journalism makes a new awareness of this matter possible. All in all, the book is an impressive, informative and comprehensive. The book can be characterized with personalization of ideas which the author is putting within each chapter. In most cases, the book is based on giving many great ideas, on the one hand, yet, failing in the way they show the mechanism of how these ideas can be put into practice
Jeff Himmelman has conducted a wonderful survey of the life road of Ben Bradlee. Evidently, the ideas presented in the book are definitely helpful. Despite the fact there are some slight drawbacks, it is the work giving us profound estimation of our existence at present time and also reviewing the norms of morality. It is necessary to take into consideration the fact that this book is worth reading.
Speculating upon the ideas mentioned in Himmelman’s book, one should clearly understand that the author wrote about the drawbacks of so-called gods of journalism. The thing is that even widely-acknowledged journalists are likely to deceive the readers. The book, which in under discussion, represents a realistic portrait of journalism containing much controversial content. Inevitably, Ben Bradlee was not ideal in his professional practice; it becomes apparent while reading the Himmelman’s book. Although Jeff Himmelman did not organize his book in a chronological order, it still encloses an absolutely complete image of Ben Bradlee. Apart from many facts about Ben Bradlee that many people were aware of since the publication of his autobiography, Jeff Himmelman still managed to show Bradlee’s charisma in a different way. The point is that the author decided to advance an argument that Ben Bradlee was actually not the one the most people might think. In accordance with Himmelman’s statements, the area of journalism occurs as the source of numerous tricks used in order to outperform the opponents.
The discussion book is indisputably worth reading, since it can change people’s viewpoints about the way the celebrities are treated; the author definitely succeeded in disclosing the weaknesses and shortcomings of appraised icons.

Works Cited

Himmelman, Jeff. “Yours in Truth: About Ben Bradlee.” Random House (May 8, 2012).
Print.