Like everyone else who has posted, I was really confused by our writing assignment this week. I mean, what is a profile? But after reading the story Chris Jones did on Roger Ebert everything started to make more sense. A profile, then, is like an interview but expanded, so that setting and context and even the interviewer's own thoughts and emotions become part of the tapestry that is the story. And that is really cool!
What I liked the most about Jones's profile of Ebert is the beginning; his prologue, as it were. Having Jones write in the present tense allowed readers to feel as if we were with Ebert in the theater, watching the man critique a movie in 'real-time'. It was new and fresh, and allowed us to see Ebert as he is now, a man dealing with crippling injuries, and yet still thriving. However, it is not just Ebert we learn about throughout the story. Jones himself comes into focus, however slightly, through his own narration. There is a gentleness, a respect with which the man describes Ebert: "Some things aren't as important as they once were; some things are more important than ever. He has built for himself a new kind of universe. Roger Ebert is no mystic, but he knows things we don't know." It's delicate and beautiful and says as much about Jones's own need to honor Ebert as it says about Ebert himself. And isn't that the point of these profiles? To describe others and in doing so describe ourselves?
Your point about profiles as a mechanism for describing the author is something I never thought about, but it makes so much sense. We take from every experience to create our own perspectives, so the particulars a person chooses to include in writing a profile about someone else most definitely is indicative of the author's own mentality.
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