Apr 23 2007
David Halberstam Passed Away
I was waiting at a traffic light when I heard the news that David Halberstam just died. All I remember now was that for a long while after hearing the news, I just stared at the muffler of the car ahead of me, not even knowing while I was moving or not.
I thought the world of Halberstam: he was the one who introduced America to me. Through his books, The Powers That Be and The Best and the Brightest, I came to know so many things about this country and so many characters in its history. Today, writers like him are perhaps dime a dozen. However, when I was 17 or 18 still in China, he was like a mentor I never met. I read Chinese edition of The Powers That Be so many times I even brought it with other must-haves when I moved to the States.
Although my father is a journalist, he’s left a mixed impression on me: on the one hand, I know he’s a wordsmith for the authority. But when he is not working and let his guard down, things he says and stories he tells are just fascinating. Yet I never know what journalism really is until I read The Powers That Be.
Although Halberstam failed to inspire me to become a journalist, he’d succeeded in openning my mind. There was never any doubt whether to become a citizen here–I’d always wanted to join this polity thanks to the works of Halberstam.