Interview with the San Francisco Chronicle’s John Flinn
Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 05.05.06 | 2:57 PM ET
We’ve linked to more than a few terrific travel columns that John Flinn has written for the San Francisco Chronicle. Now, Rolf Potts has posted a fine interview with Flinn, a writer, editor and resident mountain climber at the Chronicle’s travel section. Among the highlights (or lowlights), Flinn echoes countless others in the newspaper business with bad news for travel writers: “Circulation and revenues are down throughout the newspaper industry, which translates into less space to print stories and less money to buy them.” For those dogged enough to keep writing, he observes: “It’s not about the traveling, it’s about the writing. Editors are looking for writers who dabble in travel rather than travelers who dabble in writing. Plop Pico Iyer down at a Stuckey’s on the Jersey Turnpike and I guarantee he’ll come back with a great story. On the other hand, a dozen men have walked on the moon and not one has written anything worth reading about it.” Which makes me think we really need to send Pico Iyer to the moon. Imagine the possibilities. He could could wax philosophical about jet lag (or rocket lag), outer space-style. He could write about video night in a lunar crater. But something tells me that’s not in the Chronicle’s travel budget.
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Jim Benning is the editor and co-founder of World Hum.
