My favorite newspaper article.

Over the years, I have read countless newspapers, magazines, books, blogs, and postings.  I have been inspired, confused, dismayed, educated, informed, outraged, misled, disappointed, relieved, encouraged, assured, influenced, stimulated, transported, convinced, and energized in one way or another by everything I have come across for the past 60 years.  And still standing at the top of my favorite books is Will Durant’s Mansions of Philosophy.
https://tonywalkerpost.com/2015/06/13/my-favorite-things-003/

But at the top of my list of newspaper articles sits Janan Ganesh’s The Devil and Roger Federer.  Published in 2017 in London’s Financial Times, Janan exquisitely elucidates what I agree are the essentials of preparing for the world we are living in.
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“To prosper in life, or just to withstand its vicissitudes, a person has to possess some dark traits in controlled doses: aggression, swagger, ruthlessness verging on chicanery, an ability to block out other people and their judgments.”  – Janan Ganesh
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Admittedly, I had a hard time writing after reading this article.  What fascinated me most was that it was a throw-away article by Janan.  No Pulitzer Prize ambitions here, no scoops, and certainly not front-page news – just everyday journalism with terrific insight, written in a cadence that challenges my writing rhythm every time I have a go at the keyboard.  It is this kind of brilliance I admire most.  It’s not only having the intuition, but, more importantly, the ability to transport it succinctly and convincingly while entertaining and enthralling with every phrase –  and to do it all so effortlessly.
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I continue to read the Devil and Roger Federer on occasion and I recommend it often.
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“There is such a thing as the optimal amount of devil in a person, and it is not zero.  Call it the Federer Quotient.”  Janan Ganesh