Journalism without idealism is little more than the daily vomit of convenient facts in the service of power and money. It’s a dreary and pitiful occupation, and that’s how much of the public regards it. At the other end of the trade, however, idealistic journalism or “guerrilla journalism” can easily curdle into self-pleasuring smugness – the romanticism of the floppy-haired lone hero, one foot forever hovering by a nearby barricade. Who was it that said more journalists had been ruined by self-importance than by alcohol?
So, trouble in both directions. The life of Claud Cockburn, here deftly narrated by his son, the exceptional and award-winning foreign correspondent Patrick Cockburn, provides the perfect glass through which to squint at this conundrum.
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