Coaxing Out the Story

It is striking that your compelling imagery, your compelling analysis rests on very great simplicity -- hearing, listening well, and recording and putting things together.

I take that as a great compliment. I was in a class the other day and we were talking about interviewing. And they said how do you get -- for example, there is a woman who is absolutely crucial to the El Mozote story named Rufina Amaya who was the one surviving adult witness of what happened in the massacre.

That is a great compliment, thank you. There is a woman who is absolutely crucial to the El Mozote story named Rufina Amaya who was the one surviving adult witness of what happened....

We should clarify that this was an incident where the military slew over 700 children, women, and men.

Yes. That is right. During one day. She had witnessed it, and she had told the story various times. So how do you interview her and absolutely bring her back from telling the story, that is repeating it, to being there. In other words, to getting her to be at the event, speaking from there, not from a retelling. You have a similar problem with people on book tours. The mouth just goes. They are not thinking anymore about the actual questions.

Yes. That is right. During one day. Rufina Amaya had witnessed it, and she had told the story a number of times. So how do you interview her and bring her back from re-telling the story -- that is, repeating it -- to being there? In other words, how do you get her to back the event, speaking from there, not from a retelling of it?

You have to establish with anyone you interview obviously a relationship, a human relationship where they have trust in you and they feel that you are sympathetic to them. They want to talk and they feel like you are listening and this can take a long time. But it is the crucial part of doing one of these stories. You have to have them speak and trust you. It can be very difficult. Janet Malcolm, my colleague at the New Yorker, has written in The Journalist and the Murderer -- very controversial -- how each writer is a seducer in a way and there is a lot of truth to that. You are presenting yourself in a way that will get people to trust you and that is a fact, a fact of life, if you are going to be doing this trade or this business or what ever you like to call it. You have to learn how to talk to people. Any kind of people.

You have to establish with anyone you interview a relationship where they have trust in you and they feel that you are sympathetic to them. They want to talk and they have to feel that you are listening and doing this can take a long time. But it is the critical part of doing one of these stories. You have to persuade people to trust you. It can be very difficult. Janet Malcolm, my colleague at The New Yorker, has written in her very controversial book, The Journalist and the Murderer, how each writer is a in a way seducer; I think there is a lot of truth to that. You must present yourself in a way that will get people to trust you and that is a fact of life, if you are going to practice this trade or this business or whatever you want to call it. You have to learn how to talk to people -- all kinds of people.

Your work has won a number of awards. How do you see your writings contributing to the moral education of your readers on the one hand, and the policy debate on the other?

That is a difficult question. I try to tell the story, to get it right, and to tell it well. I really don't think about the moral education of readers. Insofar as I think of readers, I think of them as people who might get bored. I am sorry, but that is the case. I think they have a right to expect a story that is told tautly, even though what I write tends to be long. So the moral issues just come out of the particular stories.

That is a difficult question. I do my best to tell the story and to get it right -- and, I hope, to tell it well. I really don't think explicitly about the "moral education" of readers. Insofar as I think of readers, I worry about them getting bored -- I am sorry, but that is the case. I think readers have a right to expect a story that is told tautly, even when the narrative is long. For me, the moral issues -- and I certainly am not saying they're not there -- emerged naturally from the particular stories.

Bosnia is for many Americans, certainly American officials, a deeply moral problem. Is there something we owed to this place? Why? The Cold War is over. Why is there any responsibility there? Is it because of national security? Is it because of idealistic reasons because of the number of people being killed and the horror of the place? Should that matter? Should we be in a position to bemoan it, denounce it but not necessarily intervene to stop it? And finally, how do officials who in the end are employed by us, who are our leaders and ours servants (that is how our government is supposed to work), how do they behave and how is their behavior influenced by us?

For many Americans, the wars in Croatia, Bosnia, and now Kosovo, are deeply moral concerns. To obseerve that, however, is only the beginning. Is there something we owe to this place? Why? The Cold War is over. Why do Americans bear any responsibility? Because of our "national security?" Or because of idealistic reasons -- because of the number of people being killed, the sheer horror of the place? Should that matter? Should Americans place themselves in a position to bemoan it, denounce it but not necessarily intervene to stop it? And finally, how do the officials who are both our leaders and our servants behave, and how is their behavior influenced by the public they rely on for votes?

In that way, we are implicated all the time. We have a weight in the world as Americans that is very, very great. And this is one thing I find is a pity: Americans don't tend to be aware of that. That we will look at a place like a searchlight. Nicaragua, El Salvador, Grenada, Haiti. The searchlight will focus for a few moments in time. Enough time, perhaps, to intervene, to make an enormous difference in a country, and the searchlight, the focus for those people sitting in the United States, who suddenly learn a little about it, the searchlight will move on and this place will be in darkness again, with a few more ruins and a few more problems. And that I think is a very great pity.

As Americans, of course, we are implicated all the time. We have a weight in the world that is very, very great. It is a pity that Americans tend not to be aware of that. Americans tend to focus their gaze on a place like a searchlight. Nicaragua, El Salvador, Grenada, Haiti -- the searchlight will focus for a few moments, enough time, perhaps, to intervene, to make an enormous difference in a country. And then the searchlight, the focus for those people sitting in the United States will move on and this place will be left in darkness again, with a few more ruins and a few more problems. And that I think is a very great pity. And the damage is done not only to those now darkened places, but to ourselves.

Insofar as you can tell the story so that it is as full as possible, so it is captivating, and also moving, but you get it right, which is a very pompous thing to say, but nonetheless that is what your ambition has to be, that is where you are successful. But I don't have any pretensions to alter the moral views of people. That is up to them, I guess.

I hope to tell the story as fully as possible, and to get it right. That's ambitious enough. I don't have any pretensions to alter the moral views of people. I'm afraid that is up to them.