One More Time: The Best of Mike Royko.

• Author: Dudczak, Craig A.
• Position: For the Love of Mike: More of the Best of Mike Royko - Book review

One More Time: The Best of Mike Royko. By Mike Royko. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999; pp. xviii + 275. $22.00 cloth; $12.00 paper.

For the Love of Mike: More of the Best of Mike Royko. By Mike Royko. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001; pp. xxi + 270. $22.00 cloth; $13.00 paper.

Most argumentation courses make at least passing reference to Plato. His method of dialectic, illustrated in Socratic dialogues such as Phaedrus, Gorgias, and Symposium, is familiar to many students. Invariably, someone will ask whether there are contemporary examples of dialogue as a form of argumentative discourse or whether, instead, dialogue is only a historical artifact, an arcane curiosity.

I struggled to find contemporary examples. One day I happened upon a column by Mike Royko, then a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times. The column, "A Poll Cut on the Bias," began ostensibly as a report on American disapproval of admitting Cuban refugees into the country. It quickly morphed into a dialogue between Royko and his foil, the fictitious Phil T. Slobb, who belittled numerous ethnic groups who had come to America previously (and probably reflected a majority of Royko's readership in Chicago). By exaggerating the prejudices of his interlocutor, Royko's dialogue ironically argues that, but for the grace of God and the accident of our ancestors' own earlier arrival on these shores, we are indistinguishable from more recent immigrants.

I began culling the newspaper for other Royko examples of dialogue as argumentative discourse. I was richly rewarded. When Royko moved to the Chicago Tribune, I changed my subscription. This continued until Royko passed away in 1997. My trove of increasingly yellowed columns was in desperate need of refurbishing. The publication of One More Time: The Best of Mike Royko and For the Love of Mike: More of the Best of Mike Royko has replenished my stock in a more permanent format.

The two volumes, published through the University of Chicago Press, are anthologies of dialectical dialogue in the streetwise argot of Mike Royko. Some of Royko's messages undoubtedly will be lost on a larger readership because they focus on local Chicago political, cultural, and athletic institutions. Others may lose their salience because they focus on dated events and institutions. However, many are sufficiently timeless to resonate across contemporary ethnic, political, and cultural boundaries.

The charm of Royko's columns was their ironic...