Simon Hoggart

[fabrisse]

Living in Germany and Belgium in the 1980s was weird. In Germany, I had access to Stars and Stripes because I worked on a military base, but in Belgium there was no convenient newsagent with The International Herald-Tribune for daily news. Instead, I relied on a weekly trip to the Hauptbahnhof in Mannheim (about three miles by the route I walked) for The Observer and a local newsagent near the Parc du Woluwe in Brussels for the same august publication.

I read it cover to cover and found the British perspective on the US to be a bracing contrast to the right-skewing Stars and Stripes. I especially enjoyed the column written by their chief American correspondent, Simon Hoggart. I was heart-broken when he was posted back to Britain, but still read him faithfully.

He has died at only 67 of pancreatic cancer. I miss his incisive wit already. In many ways, his column was the sounding board that helped shape my opinions, sometimes in opposition, true, but the best tribute I can give him is that he always made me think.

ETA: The Guardian's front page had the years of his life. He was younger by a year than my first boyfriend, and that's something I find a little frightening, too.

Comments

[tediousandbrief.livejournal.com]

:(

I do love getting other perspectives on US news stories from the UK and other places. You really can't get much in the way of international news in the US outside of maybe NPR.

[fabrisse.livejournal.com]

The Economist and The Manchester Guardian Weekly are two ways I've done it before the WWW became my home. It's important to have perspective.