Disgraced reporter signs book deal
Disgraced New York Times reporter Jayson Blair, who quit in a plagiarism scandal, has signed a book contract worth around half a million dollars.
Blair won an advance on Thursday from Los Angeles-based New Millennium Press, which will publish the book “Burning Down My Master’s House: My Life at The New York Times,” early next year.
“The contract has just been signed and the book will go on sale on March 9,” said New Millennium Press spokeswoman Suzanne Wickham.
“It is Jayson’s whole fascinating story, not just what happened at the New York Times.”
Plagairism
Blair, 27, resigned on 1 May amid a plagiarism and fraud scandal after an investigation revealed he had either fabricated stories or taken elements of them from other publications.
“It’s a marvelous story. I think (Blair) is one of the best writers in the country today,” New Millennium head Michael Viner told USA Today.
“(Blair) is a compelling individual and very honest, very self-critical, and that’s part of the reason I wanted to do this,” he said.
Blair’s transgressions at one of the United States’ most respected newspapers sent shockwaves through US journalism and led to the resignation of some of the paper’s top editors.
The Blair scandal prompted a period of intense soul-searching at the Times which, in its 152-year history, has prided itself on being the “paper of record”.