ACROSS THE LINES - Archive (2006-2020)

An early version of this article was named a finalist in the 2006 Editor's Prize competition of the Missouri Review . One year ago today Oprah Winfrey summoned James Frey to appear live on her Oprah television show to discuss revelations that he had lied about his personal history in writing his memoir, A Million Little Pieces. At first Winfrey had tried to dismiss the accusations against Frey– first made on January 8, 2006 in the on-line journal The Smoking Gun – even calling in to CNN’s Larry King Live show on January 11 to declare her faith in the “underlying message” of the book she had turned into a best-seller by making it the September, 2005 selection of her celebrated book club. Now, two weeks later, she was withdrawing her blessing. If Frey thought this process would be painless, Winfrey disabused him of this notion quickly, renouncing her earlier defense of him in a devastating monologue and then turning on him as he sat stiff on her studio sofa. Conflating her own fe...

The humorist Art Buchwald died on Thursday, having spent the last year of his life wisecracking about his impending death – often live on television. “I hope I see you next week,” he told George Stephanopoulos of ABC’s This Week on March 12, 2006. “We’ll say, ‘Something’s wrong with the camera – he’s still going!’” But Art Buchwald cracked more than jokes as he died – he also put a few more cracks in a crumbling cultural consensus about how we should prepare for death. The death-watch began last January when Buchwald made the unorthodox decision to forego the kidney dialysis that his doctors told him could prolong his life. “It was a tough decision,” he told Diane Rehm of National Public Radio that same month. “But I don’t want pain. I don’t want to be kept alive for the sake of living. I don’t want Alzheimer’s. I don’t want cancer.” And he added: “I’m very happy with my choices.” Even more striking was the emotional posture that Mr. Buchwald assumed after making his decision. As...