Harry and Teddy:The Turbulent Friendship of Press: Lord Henry R. Luce and His Favorite Reporter, Theodore H. White - Hardcover

Griffith, Thomas

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0679411798 ISBN 13: 9780679411796

Publisher: Random House, 1995

Synopsis

Chronicles the complex, frequently stormy relationship between media baron Henry Luce and reporter Theodore H. White, two men drawn together because of their mutual love of China, a love that ultimately forced them apart because of disagreements over Chiang Kai-shek.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

In chronicling the unlikely friendship between Henry R. Luce, founder of Time magazine, and Theodore H. White, one of the great journalists of our day, Griffith notes: "Superficially, they had little in common: Luce was tall, Teddy short; Luce was rich, Teddy poor." A love of China was their bond. Luce, the son of missionaries, had grown up there; White, raised in a Boston Jewish ghetto, had studied Chinese at Harvard. Luce hired White to be his China correspondent on the eve of WWII, then frequently altered White's dispatches to reflect his own political biases. They argued over their individual Chinese heroes: White's were Gen. Joe Stilwell and Chou En-lai; Luce's was singular?Chiang Kai-shek. In his dispatches, White sided with Stilwell and Chou against Chiang, which eventually caused Luce to fire him. Then follows a riveting picture of Time magazine in the post-WWII period. While White became famous with Thunder Out of China, Time became staunchly Republican, slanting the news to help insure Eisenhower's presidential election in 1952. The McCarthy era found Time censuring the senator to bring about a rapprochement between Luce and White. White went on to write his series of books on The Making of the President, and Luce became more journalistically impartial in all his magazines. Perhaps the most intriguing character in the book, curiously, is Whitaker Chambers, Time's "brilliant and unbalanced" foreign editor, whom Griffith presents as Luce's alter ego. Griffith, a former senior editor at Time, has written a compelling volume that captures not only the essences of Luce and White, but also the excitement of a particularly tempestuous American era. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

In this comradely salute to two associates, a former Time editor examines White's start in journalism as magazine mogul Luce's reporter in China in the late 1930s. That country fascinated both men, though they became transfixed by it through different avenues: Luce grew up there; White studied it at Harvard. From their first meeting in Chungking, where White had been milling about for his break into journalism, author Griffith traces the course of their odd friendship. The two were opposite in every obvious way: Luce, reticent, conservative, and Presbyterian; White, ebullient, liberal, and Jewish. However, they both enjoyed intellectual jousting, fame, and hobnobbing with big shots, all of which they could indulge in reporting the Chinese civil war. They broke over differing assessments of Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists, when White, believing them incorrigibly corrupt, castigated Chiang in a popular book. Griffith records their occasional socializing after the break, but accords most of his space to Time`s office politics in the McCarthy days, and to White's Making of a President series. Remembrances of journalists past do circulate in large collections, as proven by those that hold Henry R. Luce by Robert Herzstein . Gilbert Taylor

About this edition

• Publisher: Random House
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0679411798
• ISBN 13: 9780679411796
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 340