In this week’s cover, Jon, who is now in remission, writes about his lymphoma, the way he lives with cancer and with the constant threat that it will return in force. The essay was prompted by word of the recurrence of Elizabeth Edwards’s and Tony Snow’s cancers, developments that put a fresh light on what is all too drearily familiar to families fighting the disease.
Journalists are generally observers. We sit just outside the arena, looking in, trying to maintain a certain perspective. But sometimes the best journalism is grounded not in dispassion but in the passionate telling of a writer’s personal experience. In chronicling his illness, Jon is working within the visceral tradition, and we think that the particular illuminates the universal.
It is not a sentimental tale. “We had a lot of arguments when he was sick because I thought people were, with the best of intentions, trying to turn him into a professional patient,” Emily says. “To me the goal was to get through it and return to normal, not to construct a whole new persona as a ‘cancer person.’ Maybe the day will come when the persona will be permanent, but I am not there yet. I don’t want us to be ‘cancer people.’ It is always on our minds, but we are leading as normal a life as possible.”
As Jon learned from Mrs. Edwards, whom he met with and interviewed in North Carolina as he worked on his piece, that is a common hope. Jon and Emily intuitively understand the instinct to soldier forward and to refuse to be defined by the disease. “You have to drive the cancer down, way down, and you have to do the same with the fear,” says Emily. “If the cancer comes back, then we will respond to it then. But we will lose life if we do anything other than that.”
Emily recalls, too, how Jon thought she and their three children (now ages 17, 15 and 13) should act in the wake of his diagnosis, chemotherapy and stem-cell transplant. “He wanted the cancer diagnosis to change the way the whole family lived—we were going to change our diet, wash our hands all the time. We were going to lead an antiseptic life. I had to weather his being excessive about that. I know that it could rain three months from now, but that doesn’t mean we have to wear our raincoats every day.”
Meanwhile, Jon Darman weighs in on the politics of the Edwards news, and Lance Armstrong, who popularized the yellow cancer-survivor bracelet on the cover, contributes a piece arguing that it should not take high-profile cases to provoke broad conversations about the nation’s second-leading killer (heart disease is the first).
“Whenever I have all the anxieties that parents of adolescents have, I definitely care, but cancer gives you a perspective about what is worth getting caught up in and what is not,” Emily says. “And I am grateful, maybe weirdly, to have been reminded to be vigilant—to love each other while we can.”
title: “Jon Meacham The Editor S Desk” ShowToc: true date: “2023-01-31” author: “Sherrie Klopfer”
We disagree. There is a simple idea behind the changes in the issue of NEWSWEEK you are holding: we are betting that you want to read more, not less. Other media outlets believe you just want things quick and easy. We think you will make the time to read pieces that repay the effort.
Led by Amid Capeci (the legendary Roger Black consulted with us, and Dan Revitte and Bonnie Scranton were instrumental), the redesign is more about refinement than revolution; many changes are subtle. The most important shift is a cleaner visual presentation that gives our writers more words and creates a better showcase for photography. We have also added pages to Periscope, expanded the Conventional Wisdom Watch and given voices like Jonathan Alter, Sharon Begley, Ellis Cose, Howard Fineman, Daniel Gross, Steven Levy, Lisa Miller, Anna Quindlen, Robert Samuelson, George Will and Fareed Zakaria a bit more space in which to make their points.
You will notice other things, too. At the end of Tip Sheet we now have a weekly column alternating among Kathleen Deveny on “Modern Family,” Julia Reed on “Food & Drink,” N’Gai Croal on geek culture, and Jane Bryant Quinn on personal finance.
For editors talking about redesigns or changings of the guard, it is very tempting to make grand declarations, but I am going to try to resist. Hyperbole does not get us very far, and you would hardly expect someone in my job to say anything other than greatness is either at, or already in, hand. What matters is what you think of the magazine week in and week out. We do not do focus groups or market research; we simply report, write and edit using our best judgment and our sense of what will challenge, engage and (pleasantly) surprise you. How do we arrive at this “sense”? This way: guided by our constant, organic conversation with readers through e-mails, letters and online comments, we publish the magazine we would want to get every week on the ground that if we find something interesting, you probably will, too.
For much of our history—we turn 75 in January, and Newsweek.com celebrates its 10th anniversary next year—we were consumed, naturally, with the content of the pages of the magazine. For the last decade and for the foreseeable decades to come, however, we have not one but two jobs: to produce a print magazine you are eager to read, and a Web site with daily original content that you find compelling. What links them is our commitment to bringing you reporting, voices and analyses you cannot get elsewhere.
At Newsweek.com you will find a new site that uses the latest technology to make our content more accessible. Under the leadership of Deidre Depke, a team that includes Rolf Ebeling, Cathy Fenlon and Kevin Stuart has reinvented the Web site. There are more features, more video, more blogs, a Daily Conventional Wisdom and expanded coverage channels (with a special commitment to health news). Turn to page 8 of this issue for more on what you can expect to see online.
In this week’s issue, Christopher Dickey and Jessica Ramirez explore Iraq’s war marriages. Lally Weymouth pulls double duty, interviewing Clarence Thomas and Lebanese leader Saad Hariri. Evan Thomas and Mark Hosenball profile Blackwater’s Erik Prince, the reclusive head of the controversial private security firm.
Redesigns can be unsettling, and we will no doubt be making adjustments in the coming weeks and months, both here and online. But overall, we like what we see—and we think you will, too. You are, after all, our only focus group.
