Toby Young
Already a subscriber? Log in
What makes Wolff such an amusing writer is that, in spite of wanting to ‘get in good’ with the people he writes about, he can’t resist being rude about them. (On Harvey Weinstein: ‘He is obese and grotesque, with a W. C. Fields nose, pockmarked face, and menacing eyes.’) Like all the greatest observers of court society, Wolff’s pen seems to have a mind of its own, frequently writing things that are completely at odds with his own self-interest. He’s the Alexander Pope of the mogul set. ‘I sometimes think there is some odd piece of social DNA that I am missing here,’ Wolff confessed in a recent interview in the New York Times. ‘The only thing that matters is the thing that I am writing.’
The extraordinary thing about Wolff is that in spite of his seditious pen he’s been more or less accepted by the potentates he writes about. These immensely rich and powerful men, normally so thin-skinned, seem happy to embrace the gadfly journalist. In one of the best passages in the book, Wolff tries to explain why someone like Rupert Murdoch would want to have lunch with him, knowing that every nuance of his behaviour will be dissected in print the following week. ‘Perhaps Murdoch just liked the way I talked,’ he muses. ‘In the end, there couldn’t be too many people as insistently focused on the far-ranging microevents of the media industry as Rupert and I. And to the degree that Rupert was probably not too interested in much beyond that, I was an obvious and good playmate for him.Undoubtedly he regularly exhausted all his other playmates.’
The fact that Wolff is a participant in the world he chronicles, and not merely a dispassionate observer, has made some of his colleagues suspicious. They accuse him of sucking up to people like Murdoch and claim the only reason he occasionally takes pot shots at them is to make his compliments seem that much more sincere. I don’t think so. I’m sure the reason Murdoch enjoys his company is the same reason his readers do: because he’s extremely clever and funny. If you had to have dinner with the most powerful journalists and businessmen in America — and Wolff describes just such a ghastly occasion in chapter 22 — he’s the man you’d want to sit next to.
Also in Book Reviews
Also by Toby Young
Latest
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in