When the News Gets Poetic

What happens when authors and poets take over the job of reporters at a major newspaper? The good folks at Haaretz, Israel's oldest daily, wanted to find out. So they sent their reporters temporarily packing and brought together the country's literary luminaries to "bear witness to the events of the day" for nearly the entirety of its June 10 edition.

From an investigative story about a children's rehab center to the weather to entertainment, the news was in the hands of writers like David Grossman, Yoram Kaniuk, Roni Somek, and Avri Herling. I, for one, was charmed by Herling's coverage of the stock market:

Everything’s okay. Everything’s like usual. Yesterday trading ended. Everything’s okay. The economists went to their homes, the laundry is drying on the lines, dinners are waiting in place… Dow Jones traded steadily and closed with 8,761 points, Nasdaq added 0.9% to a level of 1,860 points…. The guy from the shakshuka [an Israeli egg-and-tomato dish] shop raised his prices again….

Somek did the weather report as a sonnet.

The media experiment in literary news was in honor of Israel's Hebrew Book Week. No word on whether The New York Times--which Haaretz is often called an Israeli counterpart--will take the tip and be handing over the bulk of a future edition to Joyce Carol Oates, Dean Young, Toni Morrison, Junot Diaz, and company.

Thanks to Amy H. for the tip!