FT writing is surprisingly good

Bill Powers of the National Journal writes Friday that he’s been extremely impressed with the quality of writing in The Financial Times since he regularly began reading months ago.

Powers writes, “I had casually picked up the weekend edition a few times in airports and was floored by the quality of the writing and thinking. Rather than leave it on the plane, I found myself saving it to read again at home. When was the last time you did that with a newspaper? That’s what it takes to get the skeptical modern consumer to pony up $298 for a year’s subscription.

“What’s interesting about the Financial Times is that, while it is pitched at rich people (once a month there’s a glossy insert called How to Spend It) and emphatically global in outlook—judging from the ads, many FT readers apparently do nothing but jet from place to place—it doesn’t feel exclusive or superficially cosmopolitan. It feels grounded, but it’s a groundedness rooted in sensibility rather than place.

“Most newspapers and magazines are insecure creatures these days. Fearful about the future, they slavishly chase the zeitgeist, riding the vapors of perceived trends and herd thinking. The FT seems to know what it’s about. It doesn’t pander and it’s never dumbed down. The paper vaguely assumes that you’re the kind of person who knows the difference between, say, Haruki Murakami (novelist) and Takashi Murakami (artist), but if you aren’t, that’s OK, too: Pull up a chair and learn. It hasn’t caught the knowingness disease.”

Read more here.