Full Product Details
Author: Roger Mudd
Publisher: PublicAffairs,U.S.
Imprint: PublicAffairs,U.S.
Dimensions:
Width: 15.60cm
, Height: 3.40cm
, Length: 23.60cm
Weight: 0.748kg
ISBN: 9781586485764
ISBN 10: 1586485768
Pages: 432
Publication Date: 25 March 2008
Audience:
Adult education
,
Further / Higher Education
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Out of Stock Indefinitely
Availability: In Print
Limited stock is available. It will be ordered for you and shipped pending supplier's limited stock.
Reviews
The Washington Post Book Review <br>.,. A classic of Washington journalism, a wry and probing memoir of a career that mattered when the news mattered
"""The Washington Post Book Review"" .,.""A classic of Washington journalism, a wry and probing memoir of a career that mattered when the news mattered"""
Veteran TV newsman Mudd engrossingly dissects the coming of age of television news, as experienced at the best and brightest shop on the block.His memoir of the golden age of CBS News's Washington bureau - perhaps not coincidentally coinciding with Mudd's 1960s-'70s tenure there - takes a lively and gratifyingly candid look back at a pre-CNN, pre-Internet, pre-cell phone media struggling to decode the strange signs and customs of the U.S. government for a mass audience. Revered as the House that Murrow Built, CBS News attracted an astonishing number of driven, talented journalists with a nearly religious zeal for beating the competition and creating the best possible broadcast. Mudd covered the congressional beat, earning a reputation as a hard-nosed, somewhat irreverent, prickly perfectionist. He was deemed Walter Cronkite's heir apparent at the anchor desk, and more than 25 years after losing that seat to sometime friend and professional nemesis Dan Rather, his bitterness is still palpable. Mudd paints an illuminating portrait of Rather as talented, ruthlessly ambitious, calculating and fatally eager for the big scoop at the expense of journalistic probity and his own credibility. Equally sharp are sketches revealing Cronkite's high standards and tin ear for popular culture; Eric Sevareid's brilliance and difficult personality; Connie Chung's remarkable pluck; Ed Bradley's diva-like tendencies, etc. This makes for delicious gossip, but Mudd's aim is to show the type of person - tightly wound, obsessive and possessed of a healthy ego - that made possible CBS News's many journalistic coups. His insightful reminiscences of covering the Kennedy assassination, Watergate and the civil-rights movement bring a fresh insider's perspective to these familiar events. Also engaging are Mudd's takes on lesser-known stories, rich in period detail and crackling with the urgency of deadlines and the need to prove one's self anew every day. Brisk, brusque and surprisingly witty - a must for students of the peculiar marriage of politics and entertainment. (Kirkus Reviews)
Author Information
Roger Mudd was most recently the primary anchor for The History Channel. Previously, he was weekend anchor of CBS Evening News, co-anchor of the weekday NBC Nightly News, and hosted NBC's Meet the Press and American Almanac. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the George Foster Peabody Award, the Joan Shorenstein Award for Distinguished Washington Reporting, and five Emmy Awards. Mudd lives outside of Washington, D.C.
