There's been three feature articles I've seen lately that struck me as outstanding, with two from GQ Magazine and one the New York Times Magazine.
From the April issue of GQ was "The King of Oontz Oontz Oontz" by Jessica Pressler and it's a well done profile on Electronic Dance Music DJ Tim Bergling, better know as Avicii. While Avicii not a well known name outside dance music circles, he's gotten probably the most acclaim for his song Levels and Pressler notes him commanding $100,000+ for some of his gigs. Within the profile there's some content not particularly flattering to Avicii (and which he took offense to as detailed in an LA Time story) but it seemed a probably pretty accurate look at a 23-year-old kid whose career is within the party scene.
The May edition of GQ had another excellent story with "The Luckiest Village in the World" by Michael Paterniti. It's written about the Spanish village of Sodeto and experiences of the townspeople with many of them splitting a lottery win one year ago. I've twice posted on GQ writing from Paterniti and both find him to be a really good writer and looking forward to his book The Telling Room: A Tale of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, and the World's Greatest Piece of Cheese coming out July 30th.
In the same vein of a really good feature story by someone with a forthcoming book was the Jon Mooallem piece "Who Would Kill a Monk Seal?" for the New York Times Magazine. The story is about a endangered species that lives around the Hawaiian Islands and has a lot of great material around the conflicting viewpoints between people wanted to protect the seals and those whose lives are negatively impacted by protection efforts. Terribly interesting piece and makes me even more interested to read Mooallem's book coming out the 16th of this month, Wild Ones: A Sometimes Dismaying, Weirdly Reassuring Story About Looking at People Looking at Animals in America.
Showing posts with label Jessica Pressler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jessica Pressler. Show all posts
Thursday, May 09, 2013
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Working... & Writing on Michael Lewis Working
Having previously done a number of posts on work (the most involved probably being Working on the Railroad... with help from Robert Fulghum & Patrick Swayze), it seemed high time to revisit the subject... and link to a guy doing work very very well right now.
A couple of concepts around work have been floating in my head lately... that of everything counts and taking a path.
Everything counts as a perspective is something to employ (pardon the pun) when looking at where we want to go or want we want to be doing career-wise. It can oft be a daunting task looking at something new, but the past shouldn't be discounted when looking to the future. Past experiences (whether those be education, past jobs held or roles within those jobs) can very well provide the linkages to the go-forward ideal.
The old jobs held may not related to the future jobs sought, but the connections and relationships from those prior roles could well provide that entree to what is desired... just gotta be proactive about looking. At the same time, skills from the past may not necessarily be the skills that a desired job would employ, but perhaps the skills learned could either get a foot in the door of something new, or even be used in the finding of thing new.
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Taking a path in relation to careers and job changes is the principle of just doing something. In cases of uncertainty as to how to reach an end goal (or even knowledge of of what that goal may actually be), it's best to just... do something and be going forward. One may not know whether it's the right path or not, but if the current state isn't an ideal one, it's best to be moving... and maybe the ideal will reveal itself eventually.
So... if you want to do something not done previously, think of what you have done and how that can help and then just start doing something new. Maybe it will work out, maybe it won't, but the movement probably won't hurt.
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Granted, all of this can seem a bit fluffy and hypothetical, but it should be noted that with talent, work, utilization of past efforts and action-taking, work efforts can come up roses.
To that point in the writer world, there's the subject of It’s Good to Be Michael Lewis. Pretty fascinating on the author by Jessica Pressler for New York Magazine. It's a solid piece and Lewis an excellent writer deserving of success... and he's certainly knee-deep in success right now.
A couple of concepts around work have been floating in my head lately... that of everything counts and taking a path.
Everything counts as a perspective is something to employ (pardon the pun) when looking at where we want to go or want we want to be doing career-wise. It can oft be a daunting task looking at something new, but the past shouldn't be discounted when looking to the future. Past experiences (whether those be education, past jobs held or roles within those jobs) can very well provide the linkages to the go-forward ideal.
The old jobs held may not related to the future jobs sought, but the connections and relationships from those prior roles could well provide that entree to what is desired... just gotta be proactive about looking. At the same time, skills from the past may not necessarily be the skills that a desired job would employ, but perhaps the skills learned could either get a foot in the door of something new, or even be used in the finding of thing new.
-----
Taking a path in relation to careers and job changes is the principle of just doing something. In cases of uncertainty as to how to reach an end goal (or even knowledge of of what that goal may actually be), it's best to just... do something and be going forward. One may not know whether it's the right path or not, but if the current state isn't an ideal one, it's best to be moving... and maybe the ideal will reveal itself eventually.
So... if you want to do something not done previously, think of what you have done and how that can help and then just start doing something new. Maybe it will work out, maybe it won't, but the movement probably won't hurt.
-----
Granted, all of this can seem a bit fluffy and hypothetical, but it should be noted that with talent, work, utilization of past efforts and action-taking, work efforts can come up roses.
To that point in the writer world, there's the subject of It’s Good to Be Michael Lewis. Pretty fascinating on the author by Jessica Pressler for New York Magazine. It's a solid piece and Lewis an excellent writer deserving of success... and he's certainly knee-deep in success right now.
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