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Can't talk about the McPhee method without also talking about his text editor :)
So is the "alpha" he talks about a bunch of rexx scripts that run on top of an xedit clone?
As far as I can tell it's a limited subset of REXX called KEXX: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XEDIT#KEXX but I'm not sure; I can't find any specific details. But pretty much, yes. This article: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/28/magazine/the-mind-of-john... says he's one of the few remaining users.
People may not recognize the significance of the author - a lot of McPhee's (nonfiction) stories have surfaced repeatedly on HN, and/or been recommended in highest terms here. They are benchmark essays of deep inquiry into things we tend to overlook.
Saw the word 'mansplainer' and immediately closed the tab.
Especially since it really doesn't seem to have anything to do with the rest of the piece. Why choose to open with a paragraph that is unnecessarily gendered and insulting because of it? The author surely knows that it's going to be immediately divisive -- they could have left it out completely and just said that McPhee's writing pulls you in and is difficult to put down.
I discovered him in the 80s and have read and completely enjoyed literally every book he has written. He’s a true wordsmith and worthy of the time it takes to read his books.
I first read him when somebody recommended "La Place de la Concorde Suisse" to me. Having served in, and opposed the Swiss army myself (considering it an utter waste of time and money), I found his writing one sided, and rather naively regurgitating pro-army propaganda.
It was only some years later, reading "Atchafalaya", that I started appreciating his writing: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1987/02/23/atchafalaya
Beware of the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect[1], although I also enjoy McPhee. In this case, as a geologist, I find his geology stuff to be pretty good.
[1]https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/65213-briefly-stated-the-ge...
I'm not a geologist but I am interested in the science and have done a bit of reading on it. His books, particularly Assembling California, have always intrigued me. I've always wondered how professional geologists look at them. Given that he spent a lot of time in the company of some highly respected scientists, I imagine he got most of what he wrote right.