Former news correspondent Lynn Sherr speaks at SJU

Accomplished journalist and author Lynn Sherr returned to her hometown last Monday to speak to students at Saint Joseph's University about the seamless transitions that have allowed her life to flow from one endeavor to the next. Sherr spoke about her experiences growing up near St. Joe's campus in Lower Merion, to her early job as an Associated Press writer in New York, to a successful career as a "20/20" correspondent, and to now getting ready to publish a book about racing through the Helles Lake last summer.  In her lecture, titled "Swimming through the Classics," Sherr shared with students the ways in which her undergraduate studies in Greek have helped her to see the world through new eyes.

A Greek major in the 1960s, Sherr spoke to a group of students who are pursuing their passion in the classics at St. Joe's , just as she did at her own alma matter, Wellesley College.  Sherr always knew without a shadow of a doubt that her professional career would be as a journalist.

"I wanted to become a journalist to find and tell the truth…and to make order of a disordered world," said Sherr.

It wasn't until two "riveting" teachers, one a high school ancient history teacher and the other a first-year Greek college professor, inspired her to focus her college studies in Greek instead of English, as she had always intended.  Although journalism may seem to be an unexpected career path for a Greek major, over the years she can attest to the ways in which her undergraduate studies in the classics benefitted both her personal as well as her professional life.

"Studying Greek," said Sherr, "has made me a better person."

Through an entertaining set of anecdotes, Sherr described how her studies in Greek allowed her to see the world through a unique perspective.  She described a series of connections and parallels that she has found in the world in which we live today, and in the world in which the ancient Greeks dwelled.

Upon graduating college, Sherr moved to New York City to follow her dreams of becoming a journalist.  This was at a time when it was not expected for a woman to pursue a profession of any sort after college, and much less one in the male-dominated field of journalism.

In the early 1960s, she explained, "Women were not supposed to have careers, they were supposed to marry."  However, Sherr was determined to follow her childhood dream, even if this meant shattering what society expected of her.

After working as a writer for the Associated Press in New York City, Sherr was offered a position as a writer for television news.  However, she explained, "I was very happy having my own byline and did not want to write for TV," so she turned the offer down.  Just a few months later, she was approached once again, but this time, with an offer as a news correspondent and this time, Sherr accepted the offer.

She candidly pointed out that she was likely hired to work as a television news correspondent, despite being a female, in large part because she happened to be a blonde.  "I like to joke that I always got the blonde seat…because if you were going to be a female on TV back then, you'd better be blonde," chuckled Sherr.

Throughout the years, Sherr has covered the horrors of war, horrors with which the ancient Greeks were all-too familiar.  "Not much has changed since then," said Sherr.  She explained that the glory of war was, and is today, murder. 

Although her studies in Greek first exposed her to "the horrors and the wonders of the ancient world," she has witnessed these horrors and wonders play out in the modern world as a news reporter.  The trauma with which Odysseus struggled, during and after war in the "Iliad and the Odyssey," are not a far cry from the traumas experienced by men and women in war today. 

Politics today, a topic that Sherr has also covered extensively throughout her career, she described as both a "Greek tragedy and Roman ruin…the issues are the same."  Both in the ancient and in the modern world she continued, "Politics are all about greed, passion, hubris, and narcissism."

As a journalist, she said, "I've had a front row seat as history has unfolded." 

However, the historical parallels are not only evident in the news stories that she has covered.  She also reflected back on her studies of the ancient world this past summer, when she signed up to participate in a five mile race across a pond in what is modern-day Turkey, a pond made famous in Greek mythology.