Sullivan on Cooke

Sullivan on Cooke - Andrew Sullivan comments on the retirement of Alistair Cooke from the BBC.

It was an oasis of calm, fascination, and piercing intelligence. How he sustained that quality for so long is awe-inspiring. He was still at it in his 90s, until he retired this week. He gave me my first understanding of America - that great, mysterious giant that loomed across an ocean. And I will always be grateful. He is irreplaceable. But his example of translating this wonderful and completely baffling place to the British has been an inspiration for me as I write each week for the Sunday Times in London. He made me understand what a privilege it is to convey something of this country's diversity, paradox and exhilarating energy. And how impossible it is to come close to his wit, erudition and extraordinarily good judgment.

In the seventies, Cooke hosted a long miniseries, "Alistair Cooke's America", which started on PBS and migrated to syndication in the early eighties (and is not available on DVD yet - which is the subject of a petition drive of sorts. It's a wrong we need to right). Each episode explored a different aspect of America; the birth of the nation, exceptionalism, strength, becoming American, and on and on, exploring what America and being American both are in a way that was gloriously accessible yet stuck to your intellectual ribs.

His "Letters to America" radio series - which ran on the BBC for around, ahem, sixty years - was heard on MPR's BBC simulcasts, and remained a fascinating, loving, critical portrait of our place and people throughout.

Cooke just retired from the BBC at age 90. I, for one, miss him already.

Posted by Mitch at March 5, 2004 05:00 AM