Write on!

In The New Republic, Mark Pinsky calls for the resurrection of the Federal Writers Project as a bailout for laid-off journalists, a less-than-exclusive club to which he belongs:

Gifted FWP alumni who went on to distinguished literary careers in literature include John Steinbeck, John Cheever, Nelson Algren, Saul Bellow, and African-Americans Zora Neale Hurston, Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright. The recent death of Studs Terkel — a FWP veteran who went on to use the skills he developed in the program to chronicle the working- and middle-classes on his long-running radio show and in his Pulitzer Prize-winning books — is a reminder of how valuable this kind of experience can be. Ellison used his FWP research in “Invisible Man,” and Steinbeck and John Gunther relied on the FWP state guides for “Travels With Charley: In Search of America” and “Inside U.S.A.,” respectively.

Count me in. I haven’t been laid off — yet — but I feel that should worse come to worst, I’m ready, willing and able to contribute to some compilation of cheap jokes at other people’s expense. It’s either that or move to Montana to become a dental-floss tycoon.