12/31/08

Hentoff Canned in Further Decline of Village Voice

Photo of Nat Hentoff from The Gothamist.

I last wrote about the sad case of the Village Voice under its new ownership on February 9, 2006. January 1, 2008, The Villiage Voice ran a column by Nat Hentoff, "Nat Hentoff's Greatest Hits: Excerpts from his first 50 years at the Voice" Evidentally, it will be his final fifty years. The civil liberties and jazz reporter learned by telephone call from the publisher that the paper no longer required his services, according to the NYT.

Now Hentoff told the NYT,

I’m 83 and a half. You’d think they’d have let me go silently. Fortunately, I’ve never been more productive....With all due immodesty, I think it doesn’t help to lose me because people have told me they read The Voice not only for me, but certainly for me.
Hentoff plans to continue to write a weekly column for the United Media syndicate and contribute pieces to The Wall Street Journal. He is working on a book At the Jazz Band Ball: 60 Years on the Jazz Scene.

The Moderate Voice, The Raw Story, and Gothamist are the only stories Memorandum picked that have any new content.

See also, Louis Menand, “It Took a Village,” The New Yorker, January 5, 2009, p. 37 (abstract--the magazine now requires a sub or purchase for this articles online--not sure but it might be available after the publication date for free?)