This Is Not a Job for Cynics — Ryszard Kapuściński. Translated by Andrzej Flisek and Magdalena Szymków. Publisher: Agora, Dom Wydawniczy PWN, 2013, 236 pages. Series: Biblioteka Gazety Wyborczej, Literatura Faktu PWN.

My first literary encounter with this author was entirely accidental, arising from the need of the moment and, unfortunately, not very successful. I was going to the African continent and was looking for publications devoted to it — not only guidebooks but also travel literature in any form. Since The Shadow of the Sun (Heban) by this author had just appeared on the publishing market, I borrowed it. At the same time I borrowed his The Emperor, since it happened to be available on the library shelf. As I later learned from the currently published title, I had come upon the first type of book (but the ninth book in succession) in the author’s output (I mean The Emperor) — one conceived from start to finish as a whole, characterised by an original concept, structure, and construction — and the last (I mean The Shadow of the Sun), the most recent publication at that time. Works therefore already mature, written by a reporter already recognisable, acclaimed, and with a large body of journalistic work. And yet, after reading both, I felt a slight disappointment. Now I know why. First, my needs were more concrete than the timeless message offered by The Emperor, and second, I had thrown myself into the deep end of its most important philosophical and social layer, whereas I was more interested in how to survive the heat and not succumb to malaria. I had made the mistake of beginning my adventure with this author’s work from the books, not from the reportages. The result was that since then I had reached for no further title of his, observing from the sidelines the media buzz around his writing and person. Until now. The character of the most recent publication decided it. Not reportorial, not narrative, but craft-based — one in which I, as a reader who writes about her book passion, might find something for myself, learn something, find out or come to know something from the secrets of good communication. I had already experienced such an unforgettable and successful adventure with the master of the pen, Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa — so why not with our Polish master, regarded by many journalists (if not by most of them) as a guru in this field?

What surprised me in these lectures delivered at workshops in Buenos Aires in 2002 and in conversations with Italian journalists Maria Nadotti in 1994 and 1999 and Andrea Semplici in 1999 — which formed respectively the part provisionally called the Spanish section, The Five Senses of the Journalist, and the Italian one whose subtitle became the book’s main title — was humanity. The thought that invariably accompanied me during the reading of the lectures, peering out from every sentence, reducing the social and political problems raised to a common denominator was: the journalist is first a person with passion, and only then a reporter. This was especially evident in the Spanish section, in which he shared with students, apprentices in the art of journalism, his experiences and the reflections arising from them about the directions of media development, their influence on contemporary journalism, the dangers arising from this for the journalistic profession and the old school of reporting events — all the while appealing to the necessity of certain indispensable qualities in the profession: altruism, humility, respect for the interlocutor, empathy, sensitivity, and a constant hunger for comprehensive knowledge bearing fruit in constant self-education across various fields — anthropology, sociology, political sciences, psychology, literature, and others. Qualities that are atrophying in contemporary journalism. In the current world of information, where breaking news reigns, this is a very important voice. And it was a good thing that there appeared a publication recalling the old, good, honest, human journalism of the tradition of New Journalism — a tradition that has drifted so far over the last fifty years from the contemporary kind in the age of globalisation. About this last phenomenon, which has an enormous influence on the quality of information, he devotes a whole, separate lecture.

It is certainly compulsory ABC reading for every beginning journalist — but not only. Admittedly I am not one, but I listened to his reflections from the position of a reader who writes about her book passion. A bookaholic seized by the mission of propagating the written word. Especially in those moments when he spoke about his own working method, about respect for the reader, about the universalism of the textual layer that determines a publication’s timelessness (that is why we remember some novels and not others), about the existence of an obligatory base of poetry read that determines the beauty of the language of narration (the author began as a poet), and about the emotions that, poured into the text, bring the story to life, neutralising artificiality and falsehood. He gives neither writers nor readers ready-made solutions, tricks, or methods, writing directly: I have no ready-made prescriptions or pre-established working techniques, because in the field of creative work, which includes written journalism, such do not exist. This occupation in its most ambitious manifestations requires an individual creative attitude, one’s own way of narration and organisation of work. This is the richness of our profession: everyone must work out their own ways of finding topics and their own style. That factor X that Mario Vargas Llosa also wrote about. And when two great figures say the same thing, there must be something in it. But the author does not leave his readers entirely to fend for themselves. He gives instead guiding advice — directions in which it is worth and necessary to go, following the trail of the profession in his own version. A very demanding profession, exhausting physically and psychologically, and for a long time also financially. A profession for a few — but for people of exceptional personality.

I closed the book with an enormous sense of grief at a lost epoch in which journalism was treated as a noble calling, and people who practised this profession devoted themselves to it without reservation and for their whole lives — with the feeling that this conclusion actually applies to many professions. Not only journalism. And the second thought: that perhaps the hope lies in us, the recipients — that it may at least, somewhere in an information niche, survive, if we are willing to read long texts, with reflection, with an explanation of reality by those who will research it honestly and comprehensively for us and write about it with passion. Especially since the author believed in us, the recipients, writing: The reader is an active person, has his own views and preferences, buys the newspaper and devotes time to reading our texts, because he believes he will find there answers to his questions. About what percentage of our society did he write? It is enough to look at the most recent statistics on the scope of readership published by the National Library. And the circle closes, with one thought revolving uniformly at its centre: as the journalists, so the readers; as the readers, so the journalists. He tried to change this phenomenon in his own way and to the best of his abilities. I do the same in my own way and to the best of mine. But what is optimistic in all of this is that we still have good Polish and foreign reporters, and that those like me — book bloggers — are growing in number. And so, you, invaluable in what you do, colleagues: keep it up! At the end of my reflections I recalled an image from on board an aeroplane — hence a bonus question: whose book were the passengers reading during the flight? I will give a hint: I felt like telling everyone around me that that Richard Kapuscinski on the cover (the English-language edition) is my compatriot.

Sentences in italics are quotations from the book.

Source: http://clevera.blox.pl/2013/05/To-nie-jest-zawod-dla-cynikow-8211-Ryszard.html

source: kapuscinski.info