Why Reading Matters

An Introduction to a Quick 9

Years ago, when blogging first became a thing, one of the early adopters was the conservative writer Andrew Sullivan. I knew his work scantly but saw him on Bill Maher’s show from time to time. I started reading him, occasionally, but I often found myself running out of steam halfway through his blog posts. I mentioned this to a friend of mine one day, who I considered my intellectual superior, and he said, “Yeah. Sometimes it’s good to have an editor.”

All these years (and many Substacks launched) later, we on this platform—and those subscribing—know reading matters but this Substack is about golf and always golf adjacent. And I want to make an analogy to editors in Sullivan’s case to how we view, discuss, and think about golf courses today, which is largely online through platforms like Instagram and X. These discussions, broken down to bite-size takes and responded to in-kind with bite-size takes, can be sharp but even when insightful are little more than an amuse-bouche of a critique. This is where writing about golf courses—and subsequently reading about them—starts to matter. The hot-take is no more an epidemic in the 21st Century than it was in the 18th. We just have faster and louder mouthpieces these days.

I grew up reading magazines. I learned to write by reading magazines (Thanks, Sports Illustrated and Esquire as well as those old executive discounts they sent to my dad’s office in the 80s and 90s that allowed a kid in rural Kentucky to understand what the fall fashion of ‘94 would be in New York). What I like about magazines is the considered take. The fiddling with an idea. The writer’s mind moving toward a target and coming down on a side, a definition, and reaching an understanding and giving it to you.

I always admired Ron Whitten in the pages of Golf Digest, and I am forever grateful to him that when I started golf writing he took my calls and was more than generous. But I have to say that on the page, his successor, Derek Duncan, is a superior stylist. Derek is my friend but before we got to know each other, I marveled at the way he wrote about courses. I love the way he brings in other art forms to discuss golf courses, how he makes us see modes in music and physical architecture to glean an understanding of what makes a golf course work. That’s one part of what he does well, but he also just writes great, clean sentences. Reading Derek, you know that he could write well about anything from the tasting notes of a bourbon to a new technology meant to advance the lives of cancer patients. Though his focus is on golf courses, his sentences—syntax, voice, and style—are the marks of a gifted writer. In his famous essay, “Politics and the English Language,” Orwell tells us, more or less, good writing is the result of good thinking. We know that most good thoughts do not occur on social media. Good thinking takes time. It takes deliberate effort. When you decide to do those two things and combine it with talent, you get the writing of Derek Duncan. I love what the Fried Egg has done to help us understand architecture, writ large, but I think Derek’s writing shows us not only what golf courses can be, but what golf writing should aspire to. Exhibit A from Derek.

Instagram eye-candy is fun (I love empty calories as much as the next guy and probably more according to my doctor this morning) and video flyovers and interviews are fun for a cup of coffee. But to read about a golf course is to sit with that golf course, to envision yourself in that environment, an act that requires all your synapses firing in synchronicity. We need a little more of that in our lives. We need a little more reading. A little more time.

This is my preamble to a new feature I’m doing called “A Quick Nine.” Since my brother’s passing I’ve immersed myself in golf and as a result I’ve meet people in the game I just want to be around more. Occasionally, I will post nine Q and A’s with those folks here and I hope you’ll take the time to read them, discover their work or more about them, and feel like you’re closer to the game of golf and its infinite ways of being.

We start with Derek today, who in addition to being the architecture editor at Golf Digest, also has his own podcast, Feed the Ball, which I encourage golf nerds to give a listen to. I always learn something from it.

Our conversation was conducted over email and I’ve edited it lightly for clarity.

“Golf doesn’t need to express or explain itself to anyone who isn’t already interested. It’s been around for hundreds of years and is available for those who want it.” —Derek Duncan

1. What still captivates you about golf?

The search. I’m kind of a user. I want to see as many golf courses as I can, all kinds of them, knowing that every once in a while, I’m going to be blindsided by the emotional connection some place makes. Short of these rare moments of revelation, just give me crisp firm turf, really fun green contours, an easy walk and I’m good. As long as the scene is changing—playing the same course over and over, day after day, would fail to get me out of bed. That’s why I’ve never belonged to a club.

2. What’s one thing you wish more people who didn’t play golf knew about golf?

In a philosophical sense, nothing. Golf doesn’t need to express or explain itself to anyone who isn’t already interested. It’s been around for hundreds of years and is available for those who want it. “Grow the game” mantras drive me crazy. It’s symptomatic of so much of what’s wrong with society and economics: the demand to constantly expand and consume and profit. From the perspective of golf’s survival, I do wish those who are antagonistic would at least understand most courses are not environmental liabilities. Most are extremely sensitive and resource neutral. They can actually enhance the environment, from water recycling to providing animal habitats, from collecting carbon and storm water runoff to being pollinator sanctuaries. Golf courses are usually the largest green spaces in most cities and thus protectors of nature. It’s a shame so many are private, but they still preserve more than they harm.

3. What was the first bourbon you ever drank? Neat or on the rocks?

Neat with a small splash. My father drank and still drinks Jack Daniels, and though it’s not technically bourbon, that’s where I went first. But it’s a pretty vapid, lightweight whiskey. So when I needed something more, Elijah Craig 12 Year became my first real go-to and I continued to buy it regularly until they removed the age statement and dropped the blend down to 6 or 7 years. It’s never been the same and I miss it, though often their Barrel Proofs are good.

4. What’s one thing you do for yourself that doesn’t include golf or family?

If you ask my family, I’m not always “present,” or a “good listener.” So in their eyes my entire existence is selfish. But I do is go on long walks, six or seven miles a day, and that is kind of selfish. From a fitness perspective I’ve found it’s just as effective as running, only it takes a lot longer. So that’s a time management issue that does sometimes conflict with the desires and schedules of those I live with. And sometimes I’ll just literally shut everyone out and do a 1,000-piece puzzle. I’ll start on a Saturday mid-day, put on the headphones, go into a puzzling trance and finish it sometime Sunday morning. Again, selfish, but it’s a rare, happy place.

5. If you weren’t writing, what do you think you might be doing?

I assume you mean golf writing, and sometimes that sounds quite nice. Every once in a while, I think I’d go back to creative writing and finish old books or start new ones, but I had a lot of time in my life previously to get that done and I never did so it probably wouldn’t be different now. Maybe I’d go harder into the podcast space. There doesn’t seem to be a limit to the interest available to that media sector and some people do quite well in it. Or maybe open a small business where deadlines don’t exist.

6. Ross, MacKenzie, or Raynor?

All of the above? None of the above? I’m not fanatical about anyone. Each of these designers have courses I love and courses that aren’t significant to me. At least if you gave me Ross I’d have 300-400 courses to get around to, and that would consume many of my remaining years. There’d be a lot of dreary ones and some tired ones in need of a boost, but the revelation potential would be pretty high. I never would have thought to go to Maketewah in Cincinnati if it hadn’t been on our Best Renovation list a few years ago, but it was one of those great surprises I’m always hoping to discover.

7. If you could move anywhere in the world (money isn’t a problem) and you had to base it on where you will play golf (you have access to everything in this scenario), where would you go?

Are you stupid if you don’t say somewhere in Scotland or Melbourne? A trendy pick would be the London Heathlands—lots of cool factor there and London is fantastic. But let’s get creative: in the U.S. I don’t think I could find a better fit for me than Los Angeles. The combination of elite architecture at Riviera, LACC, Hillcrest, etc. and incredible second and third tier courses like Lakeside, Wilshire, Brentwood, etc., the climate, the firm turf of many of the non-Kikuyu courses, arts and culture, and did I mention weather, proximity to Ojai, Palm Springs, Santa Barbara, etc.—it’s almost perfect.

8. Who is your favorite person to read or listen to on the topic of golf course architecture?

Tough one. I’ve talked to somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 architects and media people on my podcast and enjoyed all the conversations. There are too many to single out, so I guess you’ll have to listen to all of them and let me know. But in a hypothetical, non-podcast, walking around or drinking old Elijah Craig 12 Year setting I’d have to go with my predecessor Ron Whitten, who has done more in the last 50 years to educate and argue and expand our knowledge of golf course architecture than anyone in publishing. He’s been my guy since I was a teenager. But also Bill Coore because he approaches golf course design with an integrity and quiet care that’s unmatched. David McLay Kidd is a blast to be around because he’ll drink with you and he’s brash, charismatic and cocky but also introspective, curious and honest in a way I guess only Scottish expatriate pilots can be. And I have to mention my friend and occasional co-host Jim Urbina. The light for architecture that burns in him is as infectious and large as he is. It makes me smile and laugh just to think about him.

9. Road trip. Give me 3-5 albums you’re listening to.

Now we’re getting somewhere. Going with “no weaknesses” albums (or one bad song, max).

New Order—Power, Corruption and Lies (Definitive Edition), 1983. New Order finds their voice, at least until 1989 when they find another less good electro-dance voice. Kind of a cheat because this version is over 2 hours with all the demos and instrumentals, but those are the best parts of the record.

Big Head Todd and the Monsters—Midnight Radio, 1991. If you went to CU-Boulder in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, Big Head Todd was your band, basically the school mascot. It takes me places since this is college to me, but all these years later the songs still hit. The original “Bittersweet” is on this album, and it’s better than the more produced version that hit radios a few years later, but the title track and “Dinner with Ivan” are also classics.

Modest Mouse—The Lonesome Crowded West, 1997. This is for night driving. The songs all seem to be in the same tone, which is tense, drunk and slightly paranoid. However, there’s a trancelike quality the record evokes that swims over you once you give in. Headlights on remote highways music.

Silver Jews—American Water, 1998. Their third album is the pinnacle of David Berman’s Silver Jews oeuvre. Hooky yet avant garde, silly but serious. Stephen Malkmus backs on about half the tracks so you get your Pavement fill in addition. “Random Rules” is the record’s tour de force but I’m fond of “People” and “The Wild Kindness” too.

Stanley Brinks and the Wave Pictures, 2010. Feel like I need something from this century. This is a little out there—Stanley Brinks is a prolific artist who records with different people but this album with the Wave Pictures is his most cohesive, sonically deep and least kitschy, though it’s still pretty kitschy. Kind of bluesy, kind of psycho-‘60s, a little jam. All good feelings. Don’t miss “Things Ain’t What They Used to Be” and “39 Winks.