Eric Zorn (born January 6, 1958) is an American former

op-ed An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page," is a type of written prose commonly found in newspapers, magazines, and online publications. They usually represent a writer's strong and focused opinion on an issue of relevance to a targeted a ...

columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (periodical), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the ...

and daily blogger for the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...

'' who specialized in local news as well as politics.

Early life and education

Zorn is a graduate of the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

, where he majored in

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from the English-speaking world. The English language has developed over more than 1,400 years. The earliest forms of English, a set of Anglo-Frisian languages, Anglo-Frisian d ...

and creative writing. He is the grandson of the mathematician Max Zorn, author of

Zorn's lemma Zorn's lemma, also known as the Kuratowski–Zorn lemma, is a proposition of set theory. It states that a partially ordered set containing upper bounds for every chain (that is, every totally ordered subset) necessarily contains at least on ...

Career

After serving a four-month internship at the ''

Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by McClatchy, The McClatchy Company and headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Founded in 1903, it is the fifth-largest newspaper in Florida, serving Miami-Dade, Broward County, Fl ...

'', Zorn started working for the ''

'' in summer 1980. He has been a

for it since 1986. About four times a year for some years, Zorn and fellow ''Tribune'' columnist Mary Schmich wrote a week of columns that consisted of a back-and-forth exchange of letters. Each December since 1999 (except for during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

in 2020), Schmich and Zorn have hosted the "Songs of Good Cheer" holiday caroling parties at the Old Town School of Folk Music to raise money for the Tribune Holiday Fund charities. Zorn co-wrote the 1990 book ''Murder of Innocence'', about Laurie Dann. The book served as the basis for a 1993 made-for-TV movie of the same name. From 2003, Zorn penned "Change of Subject", the ''Tribune''s first blog. When Alden Global Capital took control of the ''Chicago Tribune'' in the spring of 2021, Zorn was among the many columnists and other journalists who accepted a buyout offer from the company. His final column appeared on June 27, 2021. In September of that year he began writing ''The Picayune Sentinel'', a newsletter named after the newsletter once published by his grandfather, Max Zorn.

Political views

Zorn is a Democrat and has stated, "I'm a Democrat because I think man-made climate change is real, that it's vile to discriminate against people because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, that access to quality health care should be a right, that the death penalty should be abolished, that income inequality should be diminished and that we shouldn't privatize public education. I'm a Democrat because I believe it should be hard to buy a gun—especially if you're on a law-enforcement watch list—and that every firearm should be registered, licensed and easily tracked ... organized labor and ' big government' interventions are needed to smooth out the roller-coaster ride of free-market capitalism."

References

External links

Archive of columns
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zorn, Eric Chicago Tribune people American columnists 1958 births Living people Journalists from Chicago American male bloggers American bloggers University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni 20th-century American journalists American male journalists 21st-century American non-fiction writers