The making of Dan Barry
Talkin' shop at the TH-R
During an invitation-only visit to the Times Herald-Record's most exclusive Writers Workshop this week, Dan Barry - indeed, he of "About New York" fame - charmed the staff with tales of his real-life adventures in the Big Apple and beyond.
He spoke some about what made him the writer he is:
"My mother was from Ireland and she was a wonderful storyteller and so she would sit there and tell stories in our living room. The TV would be on. Some of you might remember the talk show Merv Griffin. It was just a talk show, a very bad talk show, but it was always on in my house. The sound was off because my mother would be spinning a story, literally about going to ShopRite to buy a quart of milk and it would become like this Homeric epic. I got that from her."
"My family, we believed in UFOs. My father was a big conspiracy theorist. We were the only family that I know that really wanted to be abducted."
"Then, my own experience was being a kid with braces and getting my ass kicked routinely. The bullies, ya know, like had to take turns."
"What are you going to become if you're a storyteller and you're thinking about conspiracies and you don't trust government and you want to get back at the bullies? You're going to be a reporter I think."
He waxed about "getting better" and moving up from his first reporting gig at the Manchester Journal Inquirer:
"I filled the absence in my social life with working that time in between, trying to find stories that I liked, rather than trying to evoke Dylan Thomas in that Zoning Board of Appeals story. Which I tried, with varying success."
He talked about paranoia:
"I remember being assigned the Town of Vernon (Conn.), which is 20,000 population. I remember riding around in a Dodge Dart and thinking about all the secrets these people were keeping from me. Then, when I get this "About New York" column, I had the same exact feeling, except that now there were 8 million people conspiring against me. Ya know, the people in Bensonhurst are talking to the people in Staten Island and they're agreeing not to tell me anything."
Finally, he offered some insight into the Dan Barry method:
"If you look at my computer screen, there will be five, 10, 15 aborted attempts at the first paragraph. I believe that people read newspapers looking for reasons not to read. They're basically looking for you to bore them so they can not feel guilty about turning the page. We'll I want them to feel guilty. Ya know, I'm Irish."
Coffee was sipped, cookies were eaten and, after an hour or so, Dan left to pick up a sandwich at Middletown's Famous Deli-Licious Italian Pork Store, get his car fixed and worry about all the secrets 300 million people will be keeping from him next month, when he starts his new national column. All who attended were inspired.
