Serge Schmemann
Serge Schmemann
Serge Schmemannis a writer and editorial page editor of the International Herald Tribune, the global edition of the New York Times. Earlier in his career, he worked for the Associated Press and was a bureau chief and editor for the New York Times...
ProfessionJournalist
Date of Birth12 April 1945
next raise
The lesson for the next U.S. president: Raise the taxes on fuel. A lot.
soccer sports passion
Soccer is a great game, and the rich variety of styles and passions that come with being truly global makes the World Cup a nonpareil event in the universe of competitive sport.
soccer want complaining
Every time some spoiled European soccer millionaire complains about the blaring vuvuzelas, I want them to blare louder.
paris car done
What Paris has done right is to make it awful to get around by car and awfully easy to get around by public transportation or by bike.
blue circles leader
In some circles Stalin has in fact been making a comeback. His portrait hangs above the dashboard of trucks, a symbol of blue- collar nostalgia for a tough leader.
axes evil back-when
Back when George W. Bush was identifying his Axis of Evil, it struck me that a longer and more instructive list could be compiled of the Axis of the Humiliated (or Insulted and Injured, to borrow from Dostoevsky).
east narrative insult
A history of perceived humiliation, after all, lurks behind many acts of terror. And competing narratives of victimhood and insults sustain conflicts in the Balkans, the Caucasus, the Middle East and many other regions.
balance bank courtesy electronic filled giving life ring voice
Our daily life is filled with electronic pianos, ring tones, the disembodied voice giving you your bank balance over the telephone. Even silence can be electronic, courtesy of sound-canceling headphones.
germany kids moscow talked union
My own kids were with me in Berlin when Germany was reunited, and they were with me in Moscow when the Soviet Union collapsed. We talked about these things at the dinner table, at their schools, with their friends.
bmw buying concert deliberate engine listening mind recorded recording
Recorded engine sounds, however, are a deliberate deception. They're like going to a concert and listening to a recording. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind buying a BMW recording and installing it in my '96 Jeep Cherokee.
buyers car cars exhaust expected filter high money mundane powerful premium sounds spend time
Buyers of powerful cars place a high premium on the exhaust note, and manufacturers spend a lot of money getting it right. At the same time, high-end cars are expected to filter out the sounds of the mundane world.
appealed berlin cover eastern emerging europe events fall history notion presenting since wall war
The fall of the Berlin Wall is very much a sequel, a continuation of the story about Eastern Europe emerging from war and Communism. The notion of presenting history as a story also appealed to me very much, since that is the way I look at the events I cover as a reporter.
applause breaking canned glass hear life movies sound tires tv
We all know that much of what we hear in life is not really so. Canned laughter and 'sweetened' applause have been TV staples for decades, and all the slamming doors, breaking glass and squealing tires you hear in movies are sound effects.
avoiding clearly largely people prose simply tried younger
Writing for adults and writing for young people is really not that different. As a reporter, I have always tried to write as clearly and simply as possible. I like clean, unadorned writing. So writing for a younger audience was largely an exercise in making my prose even more clear and direct, and in avoiding complicated digressions.