De Stephano, Cristina (Fallaci, Oriana)

Oriana Fallaci: The Journalist, the Agitator, the Legend

New York, NY: Other Press, 2013. First Printing. Hardcover. My first exposure to the life and art of Oriana Fallaci (1929-2006) was "by accident," if you could call it that. It had something in common with the half-interested surfeit one arrives at after being on vacation too long--you know, that point where you don't mind walking past things (& places) that people plan entire vacations around? These were the conditions in which I first came across Fallaci. She appears, chain-smoking and swaggering, for a potent, transitory moment in the classic documentary, Mike Wallace is Here, about the visionary & seminal broadcaster, Mike Wallace (of "60 Minutes" fame). "A journalist is an historian who writes history in the same moment history happens," Fallaci exhorts in the clip before adding, "and it is the best damn way to write history." That exchange not only piqued my curiosity, but lodged itself into my subconscious like a bookmark. It was as if to say, "Go back when you can; there's something here" -- and "something here" there is, indeed; for Fallaci's life-&-art are so assertively intriguing that the subject commands attention. Known best by an uncompromising, aggressive journalistic style, Fallaci took "war and revolution" for her subjects, and backed down from no one in her dogged pursuit of the truth. Her ambitiously titled "Interview with History" contains record of her sit-downs with figures as impactful (and disparate) as Golda Meir, North Vietnamese General, " Võ Nguyên Giáp, Yasser Arafat, Henry Kissinger, Deng Xiaoping, Muammar Gaddafi, and Alfred Hitchcock. Cristina de Stefano's "Oriana Fallaci: The Journalist, the Agitator, the Legend" constitutes an impeccable treatment of her larger-than-life subject--chronicling "the controversial Italian journalist's rise from schoolgirl Partisan courier to courageous war reporter, celebrated author, and the world's most feared and admired interviewer," to pinch a few phrases from the book's back cover blurbs. While this work would make a great gift for all those (presently) unaware of Fallaci's magisterial scrappiness, it is equally eligible for placement on the shelves of the initiated. [ISBN: 9781590517864]. Hardcover in unclipped dust-jacket: First American Edition, as implicated on copyright page; First Printing, as indicated by number sequence thereon. Book in very fine condition, virtually as new with only slightest shelf-wear to fine-edges & corners of front, back covers. Dust-jacket also in very fine condition with corresponding slight-to-moderate shelf-wear, bumping to fine-edges & corners of same. Very Fine / Very fine. [Item #5232]

Price: $30.00