IT WAS A quiet evening in April 2004 when I met Jim Bellows, the editorial guru who would affect my life so deeply.
I was walking into Brentwood Village, a burrough of Los Angeles. It was spring break, and well into twilight. Ahead of me, I saw an old man, shoulders hunched, standing beside the road. As I started to pass him, his white dog came forward, curiously nosing my outstretched hand.
I paused to pet him. In Los Angeles, it’s entirely acceptable to talk to dogs without an introduction, even if it feels forward to talk to strangers.
The old man watched benevolently.
“Her name is Blanco. It means white. Where are you going?”
I glanced up at his smiling face.
“Heading to Starbucks. Taking a break from writing my screenplay.”
“How interesting. What’s it about?”
Although I gave him the standard elevator pitch, I was surprised. Usually, the word screenplay shuts down all conversations. It’s a standing joke that everyone in Los Angeles is working on a screenplay. But the old man looked interested.
“I’ve helped a few writers. Tom Wolfe, Jimmy Breslin, among others.” He sized me up. “Perhaps we could do martinis and talk about your writing.”
I nodded, politely listening to him. I even copied down his name and email address. I was convinced he was making it all up.
Later, at the nearby Starbucks, I googled his name. Jim Bellows.
I quickly discovered that I had been chatting with a renowned journalist who had edited major newspapers such as The New York Herald-Tribune, The Washington Star, and the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, among others. He had been the Executive Editor of ABC News’s World News Tonight, as well as the Managing Editor of Entertainment Tonight. He had created New York Magazine. To top it off, he had just published a memoir and Charlie Rose had interviewed him about it.
Yeah, his story checked out, all right.
I looked at the sheet of paper with my new best friend’s name on it. Then I emailed him a friendly note, telling him I’d love to do martinis.
Jim Bellows’ memoir.
THE NEXT DAY, I drove out to the local Barnes & Noble and picked up a physical copy of Mr. Bellows’ memoir. Inside The Last Editor, I scanned the flyleaf, row upon row of names.
There were a lot of them. Famous people. Some of the writer’s names stuck out.
Ray Bradbury.
Maureen Dowd.
Gene Siskel.
Inside, the text of the memoir was broken up with sidebars. On almost every page, there were testimonials of famous people talking about the impact Jim had had on their lives. Especially writers. They praised his ability to inspire them.
I sat back. Jim’s specialty was nurturing young writers.
Was this for real?
Did he intend to mentor me … to greatness? Would I be his next Tom Wolfe?
JIM RESPONDED ENTHUSIASTICALLY when I emailed him. But when we met for drinks and I asked his advice, he confused me.
Perhaps it was the way he offered me advice that afternoon. His eyes looked so intelligent. I was sure his advice was brilliant.
Problem was, I just couldn’t understand what he was saying.
I thought at first I was having hearing problems. This thought occurred to me every time we got into a serious conversation about my work.
But it wasn’t until after he had passed, and I began to read the obituaries printed in every major newspaper in the United States, that I realized Jim’s strategy.
He did it all on purpose. My inability to hear what he was saying had nothing to do with my hearing. The entire thing was a calculated editorial technique.
As in, he didn’t actually give advice to his writers.
As Rip Rense put it, “Jim Bellows is a cryptic, mumbling, gravel-voiced enigma who gives instructions like ‘think of the shade in a cave’ and ‘you'll figure it out.’ The funny thing is, it works. He gets through to you — with a raised eyebrow, a half-smile, body language. You know what he means.”
It was a style of mentoring Bellows had honed to a fine art.
And there was a reason for it.
I MADE THE connection while later working with a Hollywood screenwriter. As part of my apprenticeship, I’d read his evolving screenplays and give him feedback. Sometimes I’d give him very specific suggestions.
Here’s what I noticed.
He ignored any direct suggestions I gave. As in, not a single idea of mine ended up in any of his screenplays. Instead, after conferencing with me, he came up with better ideas.
I finally realized he didn’t want any of my suggestions. He just wanted to know what wasn’t working, because then he’d know what to fix.
This was Jim’s strategy with me when he mumbled.
As Larry Dietz — a writer who worked under Jim — put it, you just needed to know whether something was working or not working, and he let you know that by “the shake of his shoulders and his pained expression. If you were any good, you didn't need him to tell you exactly what to do to make your piece or edit or headline better.”
It was a risky way to work, actually — giving that much autonomy to writers. Most editors micromanage. They set up an editorial chain, for example, in which multiple editors massage a writer’s story. But Jim ignored that tried-and-true method.
Simply put, Bellows hired the best talent he could find, and then made sure they knew how much he respected them. And he avoided giving them advice.
“If you had panache or pizazz (two of his favorite words) and didn't mind fourteen-hour days too much, Jim turned you loose,” Rense said. “He instilled confidence and trust the way a boss always should, whether at a newspaper or anywhere else.”
I DID NOT become the next Tom Wolfe.
I am first a teacher, and that is why I truly value what I learned from Jim.
I teach high school English — a dream job on an island in the Pacific Northwest that includes advising a journalism staff, teaching classic and modern literature, and nurturing memoir writers as they create a portfolio of their original work.
What I learned from Jim allows me to continue teaching this potpourri of subjects. You see, ultimately, Jim taught me little about writing.
Instead, I learned from him advanced mentoring skills.
It’s clear, based on the responses of the many writers who worked with Jim, that his secret lay in the relationships he built.
Seth Effron, for example, in his review of Bellows’ memoir, points to the reality that Bellows wasn’t a writer (his daughter Justine had to convince him to write his memoir at the age of 79). To create his book, he got significant help from all the writers he had worked with over the years, who either helped him shape his book or wrote the short testimonials found in the sidebars.
That’s what ultimately fascinated me most.
JIM TRANSFORMED HIS writers like any magician does … by obfuscating rather than giving easy answers, by offering absolute confidence in his writers’ abilities, by playing devil’s advocate rather than offering a cheat sheet.
Assuming his writers knew their craft, Jim didn’t teach writing. Instead, he focused on asking questions to help them brainstorm, motivating them to break through their own self-prescribed limitations.
Jim knew that good writers demand autonomy, and so he gave his writers that freedom. He refused to make decisions for them. He discovered what topics drew upon their deepest passions, and encouraged them to write about those topics.
When they came back to him with an idea and it didn’t work, he mumbled at them and sent them back for rewrites. When they wrote brilliantly, he let them know how wonderful their work was. Then he published it.
It wasn’t Jim’s technical expertise that made writers gallop. It was his infectious confidence in their ability.
I DISCOVERED WHAT it was like to be on the receiving end of Jim’s confidence. By the time I got to know him, Jim was in the last five years of his life. But he was still an inspiring mentor.
For some reason, he determined during our streetside meeting that I was worth paying attention to. So he took the time to get to know me. He invited me out for dinner. He told me war stories, often the ones found in his memoir.
But he was happiest when I was answering his questions.
On the last evening I ever saw him, we had dinner at a local Italian restaurant in Brentwood, and I finally opened up to Jim about the book I was writing. He asked me question after question about my work, his eyes glowing with interest and joy.
Finally, he gave me a little advice. Of course, I couldn’t understand a word of what he was saying. It was probably because we were surrounded by talkative guests. It was probably because his voice was barely a whisper. It was probably because my hearing had just gone out.
But at one point during that dinner, I did understand what he was saying.
“I’d like to introduce you to my agent, Sterling Lord. He’ll help you with your book.”
The rest of his advice was opaque, a verbal blur.
Of course, what he was really offering that night was the only thing I really needed. Utter confidence in me as a writer. It was a shot of fire to the soul. After weeks of self-doubt, I had met someone who believed in what I was trying to do, who understood its importance.
The delight I saw in Jim’s eyes as he listened to my explanation — as he sat across from me nursing his second martini, spellbound as a child — made me believe in myself. Made me forget the months of doubt I had endured. Made me open my computer the next day and begin revisions.
SEVERAL YEARS LATER, Jim passed on. Alzheimer’s had finally gotten to him.
By then, I had left teaching. I was in the midst of a full-blown midlife crisis. I was about to leave Los Angeles, my life torn asunder by the impending death of my mother.
But on March 9, 2009, I went to his memorial service at the Westwood Presbyterian Church at 1 p.m. It was a Friday afternoon. The sanctuary was packed with famous people.
Jim’s friends. Writers he had mentored. Artists who loved him.
As I listened to Pastor Charles Orr speak of my friend, I suddenly sat up, startled by a story he chose to tell.
Yes, I knew Jim had worked for the The Columbus Ledger in Georgia. During a conversation over martinis, he had related the experience of spying on the Ku-Klux Klan, being caught, force-fed liquor and given drugs.
But what Pastor Orr was saying now … I didn’t remember Jim telling me that.
My friend was the editor who chose to publish Martin Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” in April 1963. It was “written in response to white clergymen who had argued that segregation should be fought in the courts, not in the streets.”
Jim’s decision to publish that letter had helped fuel the Civil Rights Movement. That editorial decision helped change the course of history.
I sat there in the church pew, chills running down my back.
I had sloshed down Dirty Martinis with an historical giant.
THIS WAS THE man who offered to introduce me to his agent, who went out for drinks with me, who mumbled advice I could barely understand, who believed in me as a writer. This was the man I met on the street that April night.
He could have ignored me, let me walk off into the night.
He could have focused on the anguish he must have been suffering — the growing realization that Alzheimer’s had his soul in its gun sights.
He could have decided “this is my time” — choosing to focus on his own health and happiness while he still could.
But he didn’t.
Instead, Jim took the time to mentor me. Although I’m sure he intended to inspire my writing — he had mentored many bestselling authors — he unwittingly offered me a gift that was far more valuable than the ability to top the charts.
That wasn’t the elixir I wanted anyway.
No. I wanted the power to motivate the most talented writers who enter my classroom. I wanted to know what it took to help them fall in love with writing.
And I found it … by observing Jim’s ability to form relationships, his willingness to pay attention to others, the honest reactions he gave to writers, the utter confidence he offered his mentees, and his refusal to direct those who came to him seeking advice they didn’t need.
He had discovered how to brew an elixir that jolted to life the tremendous talents of writers such as Tom Wolfe, Jimmy Breslin and Maureen Dowd.
Now, thanks to Jim, I could, too.
ONE MORE THING.
As part of my writing process for this column, I passed this off to one of the editors on my student newspaper — someone I deeply respect and trust. She’s a senior, and she had some time that day, in between conferences with her reporters.
“Read this.” I handed her a printed copy. “Then tell me what you think.”
About a half-hour later, she returned to my desk. She had several textual suggestions. She settled into a nearby chair, getting comfortable, but then suddenly waved the printed copy at me.
“Before I say anything,” she said, “I just wanted to say — ‘Your teaching style makes a lot more sense now that I’ve read this.’”
“You mean I share Jim’s philosophy?”
“You might say that,” she said.
Then she gave me her notes.