Mark Harris

you are literally, it's in your voice, you know, literally and figuratively.

I don't see how you can not put a bit of yourself into it and also,

Don't people want that?

You know, she also called journalists con men.

I mean...

You know, I half agree with what she said.

I think the image that she came up with of going through drawers and looking for the thing, the valuable that you want to make your way off with is...

Not inaccurate.

I think everyone who's worked on a biography, you find some paragraph or some letter or some quote and you're like, aha, yes, this is what I need.

This is the treasure in the trash.

Because also when you're working on a biography, you go through a lot of stuff that is useless for you or redundant or off the point or...

irrelevant or just incomprehensible.

So, yeah, she's right about that.

I guess where I differ with her is I don't think there's anything criminal or illicit or nefarious in what biographers are doing.

But at the same time,

You should feel humility when you are holding someone's letters or diaries or memos in your hand.

You're looking at private things that were not intended for you to read.

So it's always good to remind yourself of that and to remind yourself to use that material responsibly.

You know, you're...

Your job is never to whitewash the life of the person you're writing about.