I have an opportunity to go to the Common Wealth Awards banquet at the Hotel Du Pont (Delaware) in a week. The 2009 Common Wealth Awards of Distinguished Service will honor four world-renowned individuals at a special ceremony in Wilmington, Delaware. This year's recipients, who will share a prize of $200,000 will appear at a press conference.
Honorees will be available as a group for media questions and photographs during the press conference. he awards are given to:
-Kevin Spacey, Academy Award-winning actor and artistic director of London’s Old Vic Theatre Company, for Dramatic Arts
· Doris Kearns Goodwin, presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, for Mass Communications
· Col. Buzz Aldrin, USAF (Ret.), Sc.D., legendary astronaut and lunar explorer, for Science
· Don DeLillo, preeminent American novelist and a leading figure of postmodern literature, for Literature
Five journalists/free lancers from the Delaware Press Association are given the chance to ask questions and I get to be one of them.
Now I need to come up with some worthy questions.
Any ideas?
Sue
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Sue, you never cease to amaze with the opportunities that come your way. I would ask Goodwin a question.
ReplyDelete1) Something along the lines of how newspapers are failing across the country, politicians are using modern communication methods to "spin" reality, even facts have become politicized and subjective. Yet politicians keep saying things like history will tell whether such and such a policy will have been successful. Does she see these developments as hindering (or helping) historians, and how do they affect current historians ability to record and assess our world.
I have another question for you, but don't have time to write it now. Will stop by later and post it.
Linda
Love the first question. Can't wait to see what the other one is.
ReplyDeleteHi again,
ReplyDeleteWell, I learned my lesson to write something down when I think of it, because I can't for the life of me remember the second question for Goodwin. In any case, here is one for Buzz Aldrin:
I've heard people in the environmental movement say that humans should not even consider colonization of space and other planets until we have learned how to care for our own planet. They cite of course the pollution of Earth's air and water, deforestation, global warming, etc., but they also cite proposals to use the moon for advertising, and the ring of "garbage"that we have created in orbit around Earth as examples of our not having learned important lessons about caring for our natural environments. What are your thoughts on this?
If I remember the other one for Goodwin, I'll post it, too.
I hope you get some questions from others, too.
Linda
Fabulous question. I'm no further along with my decision about whom to interview. Once the choice is made I'll be well armed. I'm so excited about the event that ideas haven't been forthcoming. Thank goodness for smart friends!
ReplyDeleteHere is a question for the lit guy
ReplyDeleteIn a 1991 interview for the New York Times Magazine, you said, "I've always liked being relatively obscure. I feel that's where I belong, that's where my work belongs."
You haven't been in obscurity for a long time, so how has your perception of the world, how has your ability to think about what you observe, and how has your writing changed since you've become well-known?