David Landau (1947-2015): Lamenting A Fearless Journalist Who Once Called Me A Fucking Illiterate
"Have we started hiring fucking illiterates?" was the first thing David Landau, the former editor in chief of Haaretz who died today aged 67, ever said to me.
It's not the kind of question a young journalist not even two weeks on the job hopes to hear from his boss's boss.
I had made the admittedly awful error of spelling burglar with an e ('burgler'), and when Landau spotted it he stormed over to the online news desk where I sat to find the culprit.
With his bushy black beard, broad build and gruff voice, Landau reminded me more of a pirate than the yeshiva boy he once was when he first came to Israel from the U.K. in 1967. Since then he had written for The Economist and The Jerusalem Post, moved to Haaretz to found its English-language version and, eventually, claim its top spot.
His sudden appearance at my desk that day and evident fury were so startling that both I and the innocent colleague who sat next to me, the other prime suspect, both froze in our seats.
After tearing through a Merriam-Webster dictionary to make sure burglar didn't have an alternate U.S. spelling, Landau barked at us, "where were you educated?"
My colleague, to his credit, was the first to break the silence.
"Cambridge...?" he squeaked, as though he was might not have known.
Landau huffed, slammed the heavy dictionary on the table and stormed off.
It was my first encounter with Landau. Needless to say, I have never misspelled the word burglar since.
Over the next couple of years my interactions with Landau, though limited (after all, he was the editor in chief and I was a lowly junior editor), were of a more courteous manner. Nine out of ten times he would call or show up would be to correct a type-o, factual error, or deliver a headline of his choice. Sometimes, though, he'd say something complimentary.
"Nice turn of phrase," he said to me on two occasions (I kept count.)
"Good headline," on another.
Frankly, I didn't know Landau well, but I respect what he stood for.
As newsrooms in Israel and around the world have shrunk, there are fewer people with his passion or commitment in them today. Too many yes men have taken his place, too many people who blunt their words and opinions to gain promotion or curry favor with the owner. Landau -- who once staged a walkout at The Jerusalem Post to protest the owner's meddling -- was part of a dying breed of outspoken journalists who were willing to take a hit to uphold the standards of their profession. And that, to borrow from Landau's candor for a moment, is a terrible fucking thought.
He will be missed, baruch dayan emet.