Gail Collins will give Alex Krieger Lecture

Mike Ilardi Guest Writer

Gail Collins, best known as the first woman to edit the New York Times editorial page, will deliver the annual Alex Krieger Memorial Lecture on Wednesday, Feb. 13 at 8 p.m. in the Students’ Building.

Founded by the parents of a student killed in a car crash during his freshman year at Vassar, the lecture series focuses on important personalities in print. Past lectures have included Michael Chabon, David Sedaris and Sarah Vowell.

As a former journalism professor, Collins advises aspiring writers to “find something that you really love. If you love music, then write about music. If you love politics, then write about politics. You need to find something about which you can happily write 24 hours a day.” As a follow up, she quite seriously suggested just that—writing continuously. Collins affirmed that a constant flow of thoughts, words and ink is absolutely crucial to developing reliable skills and a mature voice. She seems to have followed her own advice and covers an expanse of topics from local government to women’s history.

As someone fortunate enough to “hit something early in (her) career,” Collins discovered the world of state politics and founded the Connecticut State News Bureau in 1972. Noting it as an experience that simply “knocked me out,” she described being the first to cover the previously uncharted political territory of the state’s capital as the “defining thing in my life.” Collins would eventually move away from local government and thoroughly delve into the social and political history of our nation’s women.

In a comment on the grossly inequitable nature of American women’s history, Collins exclaimed that “Women in many states weren’t even allowed to serve in juries!” Her celebrated book, America’s Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines, is a response to such issues, which created a severe unbalance between what was expected of women and the liberties that they were allowed.

Trapped between the responsibilities of her professional and private lives, she poses questions such as, “Who takes care of the kids?” She describes America’s Women as an attempt to “straighten out the perpetually mixed message about women’s role that was accepted by almost everybody of both genders.”

Collins recently stepped down from her editorial position to write a sequel to her book, while continuing to operate as a Thursday and Saturday columnist for the Times.

Her columns regularly look at old topics through innovative lenses. In her Jan. 5 column, for example, posited that, 30 years ago, Hillary Rodham Clinton “would have been an Obama girl.” Another recent column compared the forced happy-go-lucky feeling of the Democratic primary to the film “Singin’ in the Rain.”

Collins’ speech will be followed by a question and answer session that all are encouraged to attend.