Panorama seeks to expand reach of newspapers
Julian Guthrie, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
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A small group of young writers and artists who work out of the back of a stationery shop in the Mission District - and are dedicated to preserving the printed word - have turned their attention to "old" media: the newspaper.
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On Dec. 8, McSweeney's, an independent publishing house founded in San Francisco by writer Dave Eggers, will release its version of a newspaper, San Francisco Panorama, and selected content will be featured in The Chronicle starting in December.
San Francisco Panorama will have more than 300 pages of content, ranging from Stephen King's reporting on the World Series to explanatory graphics on subjects as diverse as the conflict in eastern Congo and how to make the perfect bowl of ramen. There will be contributions from writers as varied as Michael Chabon, William T. Vollmann, Junot Diaz and Robert Hass.
"We started this six months ago with an eye to reinventing the form," said best-selling author Eggers, who fell in love with papers and print while working on his college newspaper. "When I was hearing about the death of newspapers, it hit me viscerally: What if I don't have a newspaper in the morning? If newspapers are going to survive, they're going to have to do things the Internet cannot do."
One-day-only paper
As newspapers across the country grapple with a bad economy and changing media landscape, retrenching in size and staffing, Panorama is a celebration of print. Big (at 15 by 22 inches), bold and colorful, with a mix of experimental graphics and serious journalism delivered in a literary style, the one-day, one-time-only paper is intended to get people to think about the centuries-old medium in new ways.
"This is a time to roar back and assert and celebrate the beauty of the printed page," said Eggers, whose book "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" made him a literary sensation when it was published in 2000.
Eggers, who doesn't spend much time online and doesn't have Internet access at home, said, "It is our unorthodox belief that the Web and the newspaper can coexist, but that physical forms of the written word need to offer a clear and different experience. We are setting Panorama up so that basically nothing is copyrighted. Anyone who wants to borrow our ideas can do so."
Welcome attention
John Sturm, head of the Newspaper Association of America, a nonprofit representing 2,000 newspapers, cautions that a one-time paper produced by a literary publishing house is entirely different from a daily news enterprise. But he welcomes any effort that brings attention to the medium.
"My view," Sturm said, "is although online revenues are becoming a larger part of what companies earn, ink on paper is going to be vibrant and supported by advertising for some time."
In addition to publishing select content from Panorama, The Chronicle is offering readers the chance to preorder the one-time product through SFGate.com.
"The Panorama may be the biggest, most creative and famously bylined edition of a newspaper ever printed," said Ward Bushee, The Chronicle's editor.
Eggers, 39, who will ultimately edit everything in Panorama, last year was a TED prize recipient - one of three inspirational world thinkers chosen by the Technology Entertainment Design organization - and named by Utne Reader as one of "50 visionaries who are changing the world." Last week, at the National Book Awards, he won the Literarian Award for his service to the literary community.
Original approach
Sitting on a worn sofa at the back of McSweeney's office, Eggers scanned proofs of Panorama. The broadsheet will have typical sections: news, arts, sports and food. It also will have a magazine, 16 pages of comics with work by Art Spiegelman and others, pullout posters, and more than 100 pages devoted to books.
But the storytelling in Panorama will be unlike that of daily newspapers. A piece called "From Beast to Bun" details the buying, carving and cooking of a lamb and includes 58 semigraphic photos spread over two pages. (The lamb was cooked on a makeshift spit on the sidewalk outside the McSweeney's office.) A feature on NASCAR was written by San Francisco novelist Andrew Sean Greer, who traveled to Michigan to cover the story with his car-obsessed husband. A piece on the elections in Afghanistan, written by J. Malcolm Garcia, is more about the realities on the ground than the voter outcome.
"The Afghani election story is amazing," said Eggers, who let writers set lengths on their stories. "It happened weeks ago, but the piece is timeless, in the same way you read John Hersey on Hiroshima today. The most beautiful piece in the whole paper is Greer's. It's about love, marriage and America."
Lisa Hamilton, a Mill Valley author, wrote a first-person feature called "Water: A Road Trip," which she said goes "beyond any generalized experience of water in California" to "reflect on the lives of people directly impacted by water politics."
"The assignment began as a short piece and grew and grew," said Hamilton, one of 150 freelance writers, designers and artists who contributed to the paper. "It's what McSweeney's does with everything: Instead of considering limitations, they look at possibilities."
How it all started
In 2002, Eggers opened 826 Valencia, a nonprofit writing and tutoring center for youth that has since been replicated in a half-dozen cities nationwide. He began thinking about the newspaper project by peppering his students with questions.
"This started as a listening tour," Eggers said of Panorama. "I asked my students: Do you read a paper? Have you ever subscribed to one? Have you ever paid for one? The answer was no, no and no. One thing I hear again and again is, 'What's in it for me?' Because I work with kids, I see every day their enthusiasm for the printed word. Young people still buy books. They read as they always have. But there needs to be something in it for them."
Having grown up with the Chicago Tribune, Eggers says he looked forward to the pullout posters and the teen section. "I miss a lot of things they used to do. I remember as a kid waiting for the full poster with the lineup of the Chicago Bears. You'd put it on your door."
Children's features
Panorama will include a kids' page, complete with comics, games, a coloring section, an easy-to-assemble cutout carousel by artist Chris Ware, and movie reviews by kids. Eggers sent three children, ages 8, 11 and 13, to review "Fantastic Mr. Fox."
In addition to working at the Daily Illini newspaper at the University of Illinois - where he did journalism and graphic design - Eggers found work early in his career writing book reviews and freelancing for The Chronicle. He maintains a "deep affection for The Chronicle, ever since they gave me a job when I was a struggling young J-school grad."
With all that McSweeney's does - whether through its journal, Timothy McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, its monthly magazine the Believer, or now, San Francisco Panorama - the objective is to produce great writing in great packaging.
"This is all a part of the same dream," Eggers said. "It is our belief that if you make something beautiful, people will want to hold on to it."
Getting copies
San Francisco Panorama can be preordered at www.sfgate.com/panorama or store.mcsweeneys.net.
It also will be sold at select bookstores.
The cost is $16.
E-mail Julian Guthrie at jguthrie@sfchronicle.com.
This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco ChronicleRead more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/11/24/MNP11AEM9D.DTL#ixzz0XsuTbwSD