The Heavy Odds Against Finding The Desired...

Biography Is The Medium Through Which The Remaining Secrets Of The Famous Dead Are Taken From Them And Dumped Out In Full View Of The World. The Biographer At Work, Indeed, Is Like The Professional Burglar, Breaking Into A House, Rifling Through Certain Drawers That He Has Good Reason To Think Contain The Jewelry And Money, And Triumphantly Bearing His Loot Away.

Journalists Justify Their Treachery In Various Ways According To Their Temperaments. The More Pompous Talk About Freedom Of Speech And ‘the Public’s Right To Know’; The Least Talented Talk About Art; The Seemliest Murmur About Earning A Living.

The Heavy Odds Against Finding The Desired... Work Of Art In The Mess And Flux Of Life, As Opposed To The Serene Orderliness Of Imagined Reality, Give A Special Tense Dazzle And An Atmosphere Of Tour De Force To Any Photographs That Succeed In The Search.

Every Journalist Who Is Not Too Stupid Or Too Full Of Himself To Notice What Is Going On Knows That What He Does Is Morally Indefensible. He Is A Kind Of Confidence Man, Preying On People's Vanity, Ignorance Or Loneliness, Gaining Their Trust And Betraying Them Without Remorse.

The Writer, Like The Murderer, Needs A Motive.