Farewell

Illustration By Robert Faires

Now I have to say goodbye. In 1997, when I was one of the Chronicle's proofreaders and had just started writing about books but wasn't yet the Books editor, a publicist called to ask me if I'd like to interview Junot Diaz, who was coming to town to read from Drown, his short story collection. I said yes, and the publicist wanted to know if I minded if the author's "escort" came along. This is what happens when you're a very young writer who is sometimes too imaginative for your own good: When I met Diaz for a lunch interview, I was very worried about this escort, who I had decided was a gaudy, chain-smoking older person whose gender was entirely unknown by me. I didn't know whether it was appropriate to write about the escort's presence, and this caused me no end of ethical dilemmas before the interview. Diaz and I sat down to lunch, while the unseen escort parked the car.

It is relatively common for authors who are on a book tour to be escorted by people who are known as "literary escorts" or "author escorts," although I had no inkling of that. When Kate Clark, who is a perfect lady, walked into the restaurant and introduced herself as Diaz's escort, I didn't know whether to hug her or cry for my mysterious escort story that had just vanished into thin air. Nick Barbaro and Louis Black, who are the publisher and editor of this paper, and Margaret Moser, who was the Books editor before me, entirely trusted me to learn the mysteries of the publishing industry, and I owe them more words of thanks than are possible in this space. Let me just say, though, that when I became the Books editor and came up with story ideas about people no one knew about or brought in new writers to the paper no one had heard of, Nick and Louis never questioned me. From them and the other Chronicle editors I received absolute trust, an understanding that the work we do is vital, and the sage insight not to take oneself too, too seriously.

One of the great luxuries of being an editor at The Austin Chronicle is that our readers are so intelligent. I've been able to schedule reviews of esoteric titles without telling reviewers to remove obscure literary references, but I've also programmed reviews of popular books without scorn; our readers seem to understand that poo-pooing guilty-pleasure reading is an entirely unnecessary and pigheaded stance.

Since a vocational, rather than academic, education in journalism seems to have served me just fine thus far, it may seem a little odd that I'm leaving the Chronicle to go to graduate school, but the cultural reporting and criticism concentration in NYU's journalism department was too intriguing an option for me not to apply.

Shawn Badgley, the new Books editor, also used to be one of the Chronicle's proofreaders. Shawn has a fine eye for publishing trends and major titles but also books that deserve attention -- attention they aren't receiving in the major critical venues. See his article this week that recaps various Texas Writers Month events (p.30). Shawn is the reason I'm able to leave the Chronicle without regret or worry.