P. J. O'Rourke

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P. J. O'Rourke

Photo courtesy of the Cato Institute
Born Patrick Jake O'Rourke
November 14, 1947 (1947-11-14) (age 61)
Toledo, Ohio
Nationality United States
Education Miami University
Johns Hopkins University
Occupation Political satirist
journalist
writer

Patrick Jake O'Rourke (born November 14, 1947 in Toledo, Ohio) is an American political satirist, journalist, and writer. O'Rourke is the H. L. Mencken Research Fellow at the Cato Institute and is a regular correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly, The American Spectator, and The Weekly Standard, and frequent panelist on National Public Radio's game show Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! He is known in the United Kingdom as the face of a long-running series of television advertisements for British Airways in the 1990s.

He is the author of 15 books, most recently Driving Like Crazy. This was preceded by On The Wealth of Nations, a commentary on Adam Smith's An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (and the first in The Atlantic Monthly's "Books That Changed The World" series). According to a 60 Minutes profile, he is also the most quoted living man in The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Humorous Quotations.

Contents

[edit] Life

O'Rourke did his undergraduate work at Miami University, in Ohio, and earned an M.A. in English at Johns Hopkins University. He recounts that during his student days he was a left-leaning hippie, but that in the 1970s his political views underwent a volte-face. He emerged as a political observer and humorist with libertarian, sometimes conservative, and anti-leftist viewpoints.

O'Rourke wrote articles for several publications before joining National Lampoon in 1973, where he served as managing editor among other roles and authored articles such as "Foreigners Around the World." He received a writing credit for National Lampoon's Lemmings which helped launch the careers of John Belushi, Chevy Chase and Christopher Guest. He also co-wrote National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook with Douglas Kenney. O'Rourke said later that Kenney brought comedy to the piece and he brought the organisation. The Yearbook was a bestseller and some themes were later used in the movie Animal House.

Going freelance in 1981, O'Rourke began publishing in magazines such as Playboy, Vanity Fair, Car and Driver, and Rolling Stone. He became foreign-affairs desk chief at Rolling Stone, where he remained until 2001. In 1996, he served as the conservative commentator in the point-counterpoint segment of 60 Minutes.

O'Rourke was married to Amy Lumet, a daughter of movie director Sidney Lumet and a granddaughter of Lena Horne, from 1990 to 1993. Since 1995 he has been married to his second wife, Tina, and they have two daughters and one son. O'Rourke splits his time between the small town of Sharon, New Hampshire and Washington, D.C.

O'Rourke has published 14 books, including three New York Times bestsellers. Parliament of Whores and Give War a Chance reached #1 on the New York Times Best Seller List. O'Rourke was a "Real Time Real Reporter" for Real Time with Bill Maher covering the 2008 Presidential Election.

O'Rourke revealed on September 28, 2008 that he has been diagnosed with treatable anal cancer, from which he can expect "a 95% chance of survival." His announcement is typical of his writing in that it handled a very serious subject within his humorous style.[1]

[edit] Writing

O'Rourke was an early proponent of Gonzo journalism; his nascent masterwork was "How to Drive Fast on Drugs While Getting Your Wing-Wang Squeezed and Not Spill Your Drink", a National Lampoon article in March 1979.[2] The article was republished in his third book, Republican Party Reptile (1987), which became a bestseller. O'Rourke is well known for his combination of conservative economic views and libertarian views on vice such as sex and drugs.[3]

O'Rourke has described himself as a libertarian.[4] He has sarcastically proposed two other American political parties: one for those with his mixture of views, another for those who hold the opposite mixture.[citation needed] O'Rourke is also strongly pro-life and opposed to stem cell research that involves destroying human embryos.[5]

O'Rourke types his manuscripts on an IBM Selectric typewriter, though denies that he is a Luddite, asserting that his short attention span would make focusing on writing on a computer difficult. [1] In a January 2007 interview, O'Rourke gave an example of his view of computers and writing by referencing novelist Stephen King, whom he paraphrased - saying had he a computer he could have written three times as much in his early days . To which O'Rourke remarked-- "Does the world need three times as many Cujos? Three times as many Jane Austens, maybe."[citation needed]

[edit] Bibliography

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[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Give me liberty and give me death, Los Angeles Times September 28, 2008
  2. ^ Full text, National Lampoon mirror, Internet Archive, archive made 01-24-2003, archive retrieved 05-05-2007.
  3. ^ P.J. O’Rourke : Age And Guile : Sex, Drugs, O’Rourke And Roll, Spike Magazine March 1st, 1997
  4. ^ Live Online with PJ O'Rourke, Washington Post September 10th, 2001
  5. ^ Stem Cell Sham. P.J. O'Rourke. Weekly Standard. 03/23/2009, Volume 014, Issue 26.

[edit] External links

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