David Grann Quotes
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The political hero is not like the sports champion or matinee idol or daring inventor; like the war hero, he is born only of tragedy.
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It took me a long time to be able to write for the 'New Yorker,' and for me, that has been the best job. I live a very conventional life, but reporting for the magazine has allowed me to do things I would never otherwise do, such as investigating a criminal conspiracy in Guatemala or trekking through the Amazon looking for a lost city.
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There was a part of me that always wanted to be an editor.
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A lot of the stories I write about have an element of mystery. They're crime stories or conspiracy stories or quests. They do have built into them revelations and twists. But the revelations, to me, come from seeing history as it's unfolding, or life as it's unfolding.
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Like many people, I kicked around, struggled to become a writer, finally got my first full-time job around 27, 28, at 'The Hill' newspaper. They hired me as a copy editor, which was kind of funny because I'm semi-blind because I have an eye disorder.
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I grew up around writers, and there was always a romance to them. They were charming. They would tell their stories of what they were working on, over the table.
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One of the things I believe strongly in is developing institutions - legal, press, bureaucracies, academies - that are rooted in the pursuit of impartial truth. That aren't simply just bent to partisan ends or are corrupted for the powerful or for other ulterior motives.
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The giant squid is the perfect embodiment of a sea monster: it is huge, it has tentacles, it has big eyes, and it is absolutely frightening-looking. But, most important, it is real. Unlike the Loch Ness monster, we know it's out there.
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The romantic notion of the clubhouse as a traveling fraternity of working-class heroes - the boys of summer - is perhaps the most potent in all of baseball.
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Because many squid have brain nerve fibres that are hundreds of times thicker than those of humans, neuroscientists have long used them for research. These nerve fibres have led to so many breakthroughs in the study of neurons that many scientists joke that the squid should receive a Nobel Prize.
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Base stealers are often considered their own breed: reckless, egocentric, even a touch mad.
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After a traumatic event, people tend to store a series of memories and arrange them into a meaningful narrative. They remember exactly where they were and to whom they were talking.
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Each person, as they live through history, can't see it all.
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I don't want to just traffic in sensationalism or in mere blood.
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My night stand is more like a geological structure: a bunch of books piled on the floor with its own strata.
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I covered Congress, and everyone always wanted me to be a political reporter.
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I don't cry too often reading books, but I did reading Francisco Goldman's autobiographical novel, 'Say Her Name.'
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There are some incredibly gifted writers in the world. You can count them on a hand. They're blessed, and they've worked at their craft, but there's very few.
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If someone told me I had to stop writing stories, that would be the end of me.
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It's funny: I don't know if she babysat, but I spent time with Judy Blume when I was little.
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My mother doesn't need much sleep. At any hour of the night, you'd wake up, and she'd be reading. She'd read five, six books a week. When we went on sailing trips, she'd bring a suitcaseful for the week. Even then, her office would have to send more.
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The only thing as murky as a conspiracy is what's happening in Hollywood.
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I had always been a huge Sherlock Holmes fan.
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Although baseball actually began as a game played largely by urban toughs, its image was soon reconstructed to mirror the country's pastoral myth.