Times of My Life and My Life with the Times
Amazon.com: The retired executive editor of the New York Times grippingly evokes his terror as a young Jewish boy in Nazi Germany and his discomfort as an impoverished immigrant in the United States. But it's those 45 years at the Times we really want to read about, and Frankel's account does not disappoint. Yes, he proudly believes his newspaper is America's most important, revered by its educated, influential readers and unswerving in its commitment to informed, impartial reporting. But Frankel is commendably candid about the Times' institutional failings (in particular its slowness to support and promote women, blacks, and homosexuals) and surprisingly so about behind-the-headlines maneuvers among the staff. He airs his differences with the paper's publishers, Arthur Sulzberger and Arthur Sulzberger Jr., and makes it clear that he didn't much care for Abe Rosenthal, his predecessor as executive editor. He's equally frank, in a restrained way, about his personal life (two marriages, three kids) but in approved Times fashion saves most of his plain, yet nicely turned, words for public affairs and the newspaper's response to them. It's just the sort of memoir you'd expect from a newspaper man: dignified, lucid, maybe just a tiny bit self-important, but always interesting. --Wendy Smith
Product Description:
Since 1949, when Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Max Frankel began to write for The New York Times, readers have looked to his work as a lens through which they could witness America's role in a rapidly changing world. In this vivid and unforgettable memoir, Frankel chronicles the times of his extraordinary life as he experienced them...within the context of the news stories that defined an era.
A quintessentially American story, The Times of My Life traces Frankel's riveting personal relationship with history...his harrowing escape from Nazi Germany...his life as an immigrant on the streets of New York...and his extraordinary half-century-long career at The Times. In a rich first-person account that moves from Hitler's Berlin to Cold War Moscow, from Castro's Havana to the newsroom of America's most influential newspaper, this powerful, compelling work interweaves Frankel's personal and professional lives with the era's greatest stories, from Sputnik to the Pentagon Papers to the collapse of the Berlin Wall. And it reveals Frankel's fascinating off-the-record encounters with Nikita Khrushchev, Henry Kissinger, John Kennedy, Richard Nixon, and a host of other history-makers who shaped their times--and ours.
Guiding readers through Hitler's Berlin, Khrushchev's Moscow, Castro's Havana, and the Washington of Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, THE TIMES OF MY LIFE reevaluates the Cold War, and interweaves Frankel's personal and professional life with the greatest stories of the era. -->
Subjects: Biography & Autobiography, Biography / Autobiography, Biography/Autobiography, Editors, Journalists, Publishers, Media Studies - Print Media, Biography & Autobiography / General, General, 1933-1945, Biography, Germany, History, Jews, Jews, German, Journalists, United States,
Reads like poetry
I enjoyed the Max Frankel story on many levels. The story of the family escape from Nazi Germany was riviting and worthing of an entire book. The balance of the book was not riviting, but was nevertheless interesting and entertaining. I might not have finised the book except that it is exceptionally well written (I guess that that should not be a surprise considering the source!). In many places in reads all most like poetry. Word choices were very excellent without getting cute.
astoundingly interesting
This book begins in Germany, where the author was born in 1930. The account of how he and his parents got out of Hitler's grasp is vivid and breathtaking, and alone is worth the price of the book. Then his account of growing up in New York, his education in high school and college, and how he became connected with the New York Times is of sustaining interest, as is his account of his career there. I thought it equally as good as Katherine Graham's Pulitzer-prize-winning account of her career, and all it told of the Washington Post.
Great reading!
The first part of the book dealing with the author and his mother's travails in pre-WWII Germany in Weissenfels was absolutely the best part of the book. (And, this was unexpected as I bought the book to read about the editor of my favorite newspaper.) The author puts a human face to his German friends, neighbors, towns people, local officials, and even the Nazi that finally gave the exit visa to Frau Frankel and her son, Max. Even after the war and the Holocaust, Frankel admits he maintained some empathy with the ordinary German folk. I found this perspective to be refreshing and enlightening as it seemed more realistic of the German peoples and their behavior in pre-War Germany. (I do not wish to politicize my book review, please read the book to get your own opinion on this matter-- although one does have to remember Frankel's experiences were that of a young boy). In fact, most of the book was written in a honest, straight-forward manner. The authos's candor was a surprise on many topics including those of race. It is always refreshing to read an honest appraisal rather than the double talk you hear from politician-types.
The remainder of the book amazed me that Max Frankel lived through and was involved in many of the historic events that occurred during the Cold War. Although at times Frankel seemed to explain in hindsight his prescience at events about to occur on the world stage. (As aside, you wonder why you didn't have people like him working for the CIA).
An aspect of the book that I didn't enjoy was the author's apologetic tone in explaining his executive decisions while an editor at the NY Times. It seemed this portion of the autobiography was aimed at the co-workers and people at NY Times that Frankel had worked with.
Definately, the parts of the book talking about the author's personal experiences, whether in Germany, Washington Heights, or the tragic illness of his wife were captivating. The rest about his career seemed routine.
A Cut-to-the-Bone Inner Journey of a Public Man
The essential story of Mr. Frankel's extraordinary memoir has been amply described in the reviews on this site, and requires no further repetition by me. I urge everyone to read them, and of course to read the book.
Hardly anyone can fail to be moved by the prelude to his story, his family's escape from the Nazis. Mr. Frankel's mother perhaps deserves at the least a book of her own story. A remarkable woman.
Mr Frankel's story might be of another brilliant journalist whose professional story alone is worth the telling, and it is. But for me, it is his almost brutal, scalpel-like self-dissecting to reveal to us his inner turmoil in meeting challenges of his life-style and career that riveted me to the book.
Early in life, he tells us, he learned to always prepare an escape route, another way out. Repeatedly, he recounts many brushes with conflict where he seemed to side-step adversity, to protect himself from pain, to indeed take another way out. Courageous and wise, or cowardly and untrustworthy as a human being? He so presents himself to us for our judgement. He accurately points out how news media (persons) suffer the worst of narcissist sensitity at criticism, yet he stands up bravely, I think, lead on by his personal and professional vision while living in a fish bowl.
How many of us as private people, or world renown persons could stand so tall? I thank Mr Frankel for forty years of helping to educate me, and the rest of us to boot.
Irwin Moss, LA mooseman01@aol.com PS. Candor requires me to reveal playing tennis once with Mr. Frankel at Cape Cod many years ago. One learns and reveals much in a tennis game.
Wonderful, wonderful book
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. As an avid reader of the New York Times, it provided a fantastic behind-the-scenes look at how some of the major events of the 20th Century were captured and recorded in the "Newspaper of record." Not only was it a fabulous account of NYT, Max Frankel's personal account of his life read like a novel--I couldn't wait to find out what happened next. If you appreciate current events, the media, and history--you'll love this book.
