We Want Media

As a part time job, I used to give tours of NYU to prospective students. One of the facets of NYU that I would always brag about was the fact that our professors invited amazing guest speakers to class. That’s one of the reasons I came to NYU … I knew the opportunities it could afford me. Interning at JANE, Conde Nast Traveler, Absolute … these were all opportunities I had because of the NYU education and location. Just by going to class, I have been lucky enough to listen to writers from GQ to The New York Times, Gawker and many more.

There are some writers you look up to and admire, but think you’ll never meet. For me, that was Gay Talese. Since day one of my journalism classes, my professors have always told us to read Talese’s work. He kinda turned into my idol. So when NYU had a lecture and he was the speaker, I knew I couldn’t miss it.

But when I sat down and Gay Talese sat next to me and started talking to me, I think I died and went to heaven. Luckily, I worked with his daughter at Absolute magazine, so we had something to discuss. We only personally spoke for about three minutes, but those three minutes were better for me than seeing any celebrity.

Listening to Talese that night, I gained more respect for journalism because of his devotion to the craft and reverence for the written word. He cultivated techniques from intuition rather than training and relied on his own morals in his career, making him a huge name in the business. While everything he said that night had some meaning, his one comment that I’ve always looked to for inspiration was:

"I believe you have to go there. There is no shortcutting. It's work you have to do. And what propels us is the prose. There's art in this non-fiction writing."

It might sound simple, but it's so true and something many may forget from time to time. I just hope I continue to learn from that.