Illinois Authors

The Illinois Center for the Book banner

Walt Harrington

Born: 1950 in Will County, Illinois
Pen Name: None

Connection to Illinois: Walt was born in Will county and currently resides in Urbana.

Biography: Walt Harrington is head of the journalism department at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Along with the books he has written, he has also edited ''The Beholder's Eye: A Collection of America's Finest Personal Journalism'', ''Next Wave: America's New Generation of Great Literary Journalists'' and ''Slices of Life.'' Harrington was a staff writer for the ''Washington Post Magazine'' for 15 years, and is the winner of twenty local, state and national journalism awards. He has been nominated for a Pulitzer several times.


Awards:
  • -- Sigma Delta Chi Distinguished Service Award
  • -- Two National Association of Black Journalists writing Awards
  • -- Northwestern University's John Bartlow Martin Award for Public Interest Journalism
  • -- Three national Sunday magazine writing awards
  • -- Lowell Mellett A

Primary Literary Genre(s): Non-fiction

Primary Audience(s): Adult readers; Adult readers

Email: wharring@uiuc.edu
Website: http://waltharrington.com
Walt Harrington on WorldCat : http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=walt+harrington


Selected Titles

Acts of creation :
ISBN: 0989524167 OCLC: 889579512

American profiles :
ISBN: 0826208398 OCLC: 24955033

University of Missouri Press, Columbia : ©1992.

"Author Walt Harrington, award-winning writer for the Washington Post Magazine, lifts the masks of celebrity and obscurity to reveal the lives of some singular men and women--from actress Kelly McGillis to nocturnal satanist Anton LaVey."--Publishers website.

At the heart of it :
ISBN: 0826210783 OCLC: 34663210

University of Missouri Press, Columbia : 1996.

"Delving into the everyday lives of real, everyday people, Walt Harrington skillfully draws the reader into an intimate relationship with the men and women profiled in this powerful collection of stories--people like V.I. Smith, a homicide detective; Deane Guy, a stock car racer; Jackie Jordan, a social worker in family services; and Sheri D'Amato, a girls' soccer coach. Originally appearing in the Washington Post Magazine, these stories, which capture a cross section of Americans, stand out in the field of journalism because of the unique way in which Walt Harrington uses unheralded, individual lives to elaborate on the great human issues of the day. In "Mothers and Daughters" three generations of women discuss how society affected the choices they made and who they became. "The Mystery of Goodness" follows a Harvard-educated lawyer who handles death-row cases for very little money because he feels the system is unfair to African Americans. In "To Have and Have Not" a young couple with two small children struggle to make ends meet. Harrington describes in detail the creation of a poem by Rita Dove, then United States Poet Laureate, in "The Shape of Her Dreaming." Harrington has adeptly combined sociology and journalism into beautiful prose. As "literary journalism," the stories employ scene, dialogue, and physical description within a narrative framework. At the same time, they also adhere to all the traditional journalistic standards of accuracy, fairness, and balance. As a result, At the Heart of It represents a subgenre that is rarely practiced and seldom understood even within the profession of journalism. All of these stories are snapshots, pieces of everyday life in America that are intended to be a mirror held to the lives of readers. These are not stories about which you can remain neutral; even the most casual readers will be moved by the glimpses Walt Harrington provides us of ourselves."--Publishers website.

Crossings :
ISBN: 082621259X OCLC: 41223925

Intimate journalism :
ISBN: 0761905863 OCLC: 35796481

Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, Calif. : ©1997.

The everlasting stream :
ISBN: 0802140505 OCLC: 54888917

Grove Press, New York : ©2002.

When Walt Harrington was first invited to Kentucky to hunt with his African American father-in-law and his country friends--Bobby, Lewis, and Carl--he was a jet-setting reporter for The Washington Post with a distaste for killing animals and for the men?s brand of old-fashioned masculinity. But over the next 12 years, this white city slicker entered a world of life, death, nature, and manhood that came to seem not brutal or outdated but beautiful in a way his experience in Washington was not. The Everlasting Stream is the absorbing, touching, and often hilarious story of how hunting with these "good ol' boys" forced an "enlightened" man to reexamine his modern notions of guilt and responsibility, friendship and masculinity, ambition and satisfaction. In crisp prose that bring autumn mornings crackling to life, Harrington shares the lessons that led him to leave Washington. When his son turned 14, Harrington began taking him hunting too, believing that these rough-edged, whiskey-drinking men could teach his suburban boy something worthwhile about lives different from his own, the joy of small moments, and the old-fashioned belief that a man's actions mean more than his words.

 

 

Accessibility