An Interview With A Foolish Optimist: Meeting Michael Finkel

In today’s age, hope can be hard to come by. With a constant stream of news that makes it seem as if the world is collapsing in on itself, trying to find hope can feel, to put it bluntly, hopeless. But for author Michael Finkel, a fellow Utah resident and writer with over 30 years of experience, the news is not something to fear but rather an opportunity to explore the world around them. For all the world’s suffering, there is a glimmer of opportunity, one that, as he says, “serves the essential purpose of separating truth from the firehose of constant bullshit.” What is that glimmer? The answer is simple: good journalism. 

For Finkel, it all began with his high school newspaper, The Westword, in Stamford, Connecticut, which inspired him to become a student writer for The Daily Pennsylvanian (DP) at the University of Pennsylvania. “Working at the DP was like a full-time job. I took it very seriously,” he says. “Sometimes my team and I would work through the night and go have dinner at two in the morning. It was great training.” 

In 1990, Finkel landed his first job at Skiing Magazine, where he worked for two years. This led him to other magazines like National Geographic, where he wrote articles, such as a series of stories about the last hunter-gatherer tribes around the world. “I felt blessed to be a journalist,” Finkel explains. “A banker or a lawyer are not hunting in the African grasslands. I would not swap that for any amount of money. I’m rich with experience. If you want money, go to law school.” Even with the opportunity to pursue such adventures, he says with a laugh that his only goal is “to write the perfect paragraph. That’s the day I quit writing.”

Finkel was also a freelance journalist, working for commissions of only $20 for any independent publication he could. To this day, he still reads these types of magazines, including SLUG, as reading widely helps him generate ideas due to a “spidey sense of curiosity” which lets him find stories anywhere, be it from small-town papers, random snippets, the radio or online articles. “It’s a funny skill generating story ideas,” he says. “There’s no class on it. There should be a class. For good and for bad, if you’re a journalist you’re always working on some weird level. Stories crop up all over the place. It’s wonderful and onerous.”

Being a writer is hard. There’s unpaid work, phone calls, pitching and failure. But Finkel urges future journalists to see it through. “You should have thoughts and feelings,” he says. “Rejection is a constant, and it’s going to hurt, it better hurt. If it hurts, then it’s important to you. You need to use your failure as fuel. A human touch will always be important.” 

As of today, Finkel has written novels and published articles for over 50 different countries. He tells the stories of criminals, wars, hot air balloon racers and the Supreme Court’s gavel-maker. 

He has no specialty topic. “I feel like a perpetual student of the globe,” he elaborates. “If there’s anything I’ve learned from 30, almost 40, years traveling the world, everyone has something interesting about themselves. If something captures my attention, I’ll write about it.”

Despite covering dark subjects, Finkel is firmly optimistic. It is people that interest him. But oftentimes, propaganda can mar their stories, whether they are subjects of or subjected to propaganda. “The more I speak to others, the more I realize most people are good. They’re decent, beautiful and honorable. The president doesn’t always say that, but the world in general is a safe and friendly place,” he says. “Most people don’t realize that most people are exactly the same, seeking happiness, love, meaning, purpose, satisfaction and family. On the inside we’re all the same. You can call me a foolish optimist. If you put it on a T-shirt, I’ll wear it.”

Foolish optimism. That is what should sit at the heart of the news. However, those in power often seek to crush that foolish optimism, for it is the power of hope that can bring down empires. Therefore, it is up to us to uphold it — to be curious.

“I love to talk to young journalists,” Finkel says. “I feel like I have two missions: to be honest about the state of journalism right now and to also be encouraging. It can be hard to combine. But I truly believe journalism is an essential profession. It lets you speak truth to power. You have to hold leaders accountable. They’re not trying to speak the truth. You have to read a lot, write a lot, struggle a lot and have energy. It stokes curiosity — you should have bottomless curiosity. If you have all four ingredients, that’s all you need.”

Writers, future writers and readers alike, heed his words. Without love, without foolish optimism, without hope, we risk losing what makes us human. So please, retain your bottomless curiosity! Read, write and struggle as if your life depends on it!

In times like these, that may just be the case. 

Read more about our community members here:
Mike Brown’s Fashion Do’s and Don’ts – SLUG Magazine
A Bad Deal in Mormon Land: T.I.M. Wirkus’ Novel Hits Close to Home – SLUG Magazine

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