ABBOTT JOSEPH LIEBLING

I met the most fascinating man the other day after returning from a four mile run in a fresh snowfall near the Bahai temple.

The very very rotund and brilliant Renaissance man----A. J. Liebling.

I met owlish Joe Liebling outside a Greek coffee house in my neighborhood. He was sitting at two tables pushed together and strewn with newspapers. I was attracted to him by his mumbling and cursing to himself about bad writing and publishers and all sorts of sins of the Fourth Estate in America of all places.

Sidling up to him I hoped he would have time for some good rich talk. Talk as dark and rich and delicious as the first cup of fresh coffee in the morning. Fortunately, he was a warm, amiable man with an intellect as thirsty and insatiable as mine.

Over the next four hours I learned about Liebling's exciting career as a writer for The New Yorker. Writing for that fine publication from 1935 until his early death in 1963, this Francophile wrote masterful and ground-breaking press criticism, sports reporting about the boxing scene in New York, war reporting from Europe during WW II and French gourmet cooking reviews. An impressive breadth of knowledge.

Anyone interested in a career as a writer should study Joe's use of the English language. Writers can feast on his work and wisdom.

I have read some of Joe's press criticism in his essays in The Wayward Pressman and The Press. They are wonderful. My American correspondent Peter Katsaros tells me that these books are a must read for every American citizen. Peter added that reading Liebling's books on the press in his law school days was the high point of law school. Who am I to disagree ? Peter's reporting has been quite good to date.

Had Liebling lived in my day he would have been a frequent visitor to Cirey and Ferney. Joe wrote with a joyful and honest pen. Like me he would not have been welcome in France. America is lucky to have had him write for the ages.

And I am thrilled to have him as a new friend.


Voltaire