Pulitzer prize winner shares journalism experience

 

People sometimes expect professionals who are the best in their field to exude an intimidating aura. Perhaps this is why when seeing Madeline Blais you do not immediately realize you are sitting across from a renowned book author and Pulitzer Prize winner. Blais was a reporter for The Boston Globe, The Trenton Times and Tropic Magazine of The Miami Herald and is currently a professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst. Blais was recently asked to be on the jury of penal judges at the New York University Department of Journalism, to evaluate the ten best works of journalism from 2000-2010.

She won the Pulitzer Prize for Feature writing in 1980 for "Zepp's Last Stand," a story about Edward Zepp who fought in World War I but wanted to be a conscientious objector. The military would not let him have this status so he was put into military prison for his behavior. Zepp spent his entire life trying to fight this verdict.

At the time, the Pulitzer category for feature writing had just been created, so Blais said it was a huge surprise to win this award. Zepp used to pitch his story to various newspapers and he was usually assigned to the youngest and the least powerful person at the paper, who would politely listen to him and then show him the door. Nobody wanted to write his story, Blais said. Yet one of Blais's editors insisted on her writing the story. And, "the more I listened to him the more I thought there was a story there. Always people that were sending him away didn't listen to him carefully," Blais said.

Journalism professors Sandra Earley and Phelps Hawkins have known Blais for over 30 years. "Her writing was always very lucid and evocative, images and feelings and things so that people and situations really came alive in her writings. I was always drawn to her because I thought it was such a unique skill. [...] She almost hid the reporting in the elegance of her writing," Hawkins said.

During her stay, Blais gave a series of lectures during journalism classes and one reading in the Panitza Library. Around 65 people listened to Blais reading three columns from her published work: "A Vineyard Primer for Obamas," "What to tell my journalism grads," and excerpts from her story on Tennessee Williams in Key West.

Blais shared her view on what it takes to be a journalist. A reporter should, "first of all [be] someone who is curious, interested in other people and other places, someone who is willing to work hard at all kinds of odd hours and all kinds of challenging places, and not complain but just soldier on and go for and try to get the story," Blais said. Journalists should also display a certain amount of kindness and compassion, she added.

Ursula Kirk, a Peace Corps Volunteer stationed in Samokov, a town near Blagoevgrad, was very inspired by the lecture. "Listening [to] her speak made me think about other things in terms of personal motivation. Especially the last article about parking [...] God. That was really great. I am going to struggle when I go back to the States and pursue what I want to do for the living, which is journalism, but it is something that is hard to get into," Kirk said.

One of the six lectures Blais gave was during Professor Alan Hickman's Film Criticism class. "I invited her to one of my classes to discuss documentary film. [...] Generally, she is knowledgeable on that subject. We had a very nice discussion, she showed clips from three films that many students would have never seen," Hickman said.

Student Vladimir Mikhailov said Blais made him want to see the films, even if he is not particularly attracted to documentaries. "She possesses skills of persuasion and she can make [one] interested in stuff, which is a sign of a good teacher," said Mikhailov.

"I was very impressed by the students here and very impressed by their global intelligence. How much they know about such a great big part of the world. And I think that is one of those intangible equipped them to really confront the future and make their own way," Blais said.