Although described as a feauture/magazine style of writing Tom Wolfe wrote in an article that it wasn't like that at all. In fact it was more like writing a story, reporters who adopted this style of writing had to apply a fictional characteristics to the article.
It isn't really known where and how this new style of writing came from or who used it first.
New journalism can be closely linked with realism, in fact Tom Wolfe and the other advocates of the new style of reporting actually adopted elements of realism into their work. This was because their was no way of lying or hiding the truth. All of the information was there. For the reader to see. Everything that happened was there and there was no spin, or altering the truth.
The were criticisms of the new style. But mostly about the writers that adopted it. For instance, it was claimed that while Wolfe insisted that using the new technique expressed the personality of the subjects he was writing about, he was in fact just holding up a 'fun house mirror' meaning that people didn't really care whether it was a true representation or not.
'Gonzo journalism' something we have practiced ourselves is actually a form of new journalism. Gonzo journalism, does take a fictional stance on what you are writing about, but it is where uninteresting things become interesting and vice versa. I really enjoy Gonzo journalism, however, I can see that people may not take to it as it merely mentions the actual facts of what you are writing about rather than them being concentrated on as in a normal news piece.
New journalism really applies to modern society. Look at The Sun for instance, doesn't stick to the same conventions as say The Times, new journalism in a way can be compared to the debate about the tabloid journalism. People need change o be kept interested, evolution and improvement are needed in society to keep up with peoples needs rather that people changing themselves to meet the needs of society.
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