Essays on John F. Burns

Here’s essays I’ve written in concert with my compilation of John F. Burns articles from the New York Times.

  • Me & NYT

    Me & NYT

    I’ve used the NYT as a source for my art for over 30 years, and John F. Burns was its greatest poet.

  • When Irma was a child

    When Irma was a child

    In 1993, John F. Burns, my favorite journalist ever, wrote an article in the New York Times: British Fly to Bosnian Girl’s Rescue. Here’s a snip: SARAJEVO, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Aug. 9— After worldwide publicity about her plight, a 5-year-old girl severely wounded by a Serbian artillery shell was evacuated today from Sarajevo by a British…

  • Integrity & John F. Burns

    There is little more on this blue and green and dusty-fragile planet that I hold with more reverence than the words of John F. Burns. He is practically a religion to me. I’ve collected his text like an apostle stitching gospels together. I have wept more often than I’d like to admit, holding New York newsprint…

  • John F. Burns Reporting on the Imposition of Martial Law in Poland, December 1981 – June 1982

    I think it’s well-known that I am a fan of John F. Burns. The other day I got an email from a student at the University of Warsaw looking for his reporting from Poland after the imposition of martial law there in 1981. So I dug up the stories out of TimesSelect and copy/ pasted…

  • Remembering the Sarajevan Cellist

    So the other day someone wrote to me through my John F. Burns website and requested “the 1992 article on vedran smailovic – the cellist of Sarajevo”. Back in the olden days, before Times Select, before all you needed was a home delivery subscription to the Times to have complete access to their archive going…