Winchell

Winchell: Gossip, Power and the Culture of Celebrity
Neal Gabler
553 pages
Read in 33 days


Newsweek says in the "What to Read Now and Why" article, that "before there was a Rush Limbaugh - or Us Weekly - there was Walter Winchell: gossip columnist, commentator, McCarthyite, radio celebrity, has-been."

Before reading the book, I didn't know much about Walter Winchell other than his catchphrase that began every radio broadcast: "Good evening Mr. and Mrs. America from border to border and coast to coast and all the ships at sea. Let's go to press." I was surprised at how engrossing this book was for me. Winchell came from humble beginnings to become the voice of America heard or read by 50 million Americans. In 1948, he was the top-rated radio personality (beating out Fred Allen and Jack Benny). He was, at the same time, feared and respected by his peers, politicians, and celebrities. He was also plagued with self-doubt and lack of confidence. When he sided with Senator Joseph McCarthy and Roy Cohn against communism, public opinion turned against him eventually. He was extremely stubborn and would not apologize for statements he made. Indeed. his downfall does seem to be that he would never re-evaluate his views and would rather die than to back-down.

At the end of his career, it was he who was being viciously attacked...his attackers had years of pent up rage and waited patiently for their moment. As the book says, "Winchell's life had become a parable, the lesson of which was: He who operates in the cutthroat world of celebrity where reputations are quickly made and just as quickly broken will have no peace."

He was a guarded, egotistical, and vicious (especially retaliating against people he felt wronged him). At the core, though, was a man that was not self-confident and was constantly questioning his abilities. On the surface was a man that was seemingly unafraid to face the enemies of the world, but underneath, he was always questioning whether he was good enough. My only gripe with this book, and perhaps that is telling on how Winchell protected his public image, was that there was very little to explain his behavior. There were a lot of "perhaps he did this because" in the book.

He defined gossip and to his credit, as the gossip genre became more salacious and sensational, he kept with his formula. One thing I found amusing was that the "rule" was that you never did a story on a married man having affair...oh, how times have changed.

It is hard to imagine, while reading this book, that the roots of Winchell's gossip column would grow into the invasion-of-privacy, multi-million dollar industry that it has become. From US Weekly and People Magazine to TMZ and Perez Hilton, we have become obsessed with celebrities rites. Top-tier stars are hounded constantly by paparazzi and are not given a moment alone. We see stars who melt under the scrutiny and it only feeds our obsession. I can't even imagine my life being played out on a cover of a magazine as these celebrities do every week.

What have we become as a society where we can't get enough of knowing the trivial, private items in celebrities lives. Do we want to be like them? Are we jealous and want to know they can have messed-up lives too? The sad thing is that if was popular in the 1930s, there is no hope of it going away. We have always had the appetite for it.

Winchell popularized gossip and now we are taking it to levels that I think even he would shake his head at.

Up next, a little science fiction with Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Phillip Dick...Loving it so far.