Journalist’s Trade

Talese and Michel MarriottNew York Times reporter and 2002 Nieman Fellow Michel Marriott introduced Gay Talese at the Nieman Narrative Journalism Conference. Excerpts of their comments follow:Michel Marriott: As a…

‘Pick three things and just keep working on them, keep reinforcing them.’Think of each of your reporter/writers as a one-year investment. Match the assignment to the writer, but stretch it…

Jacqui Banaszynski is the assistant managing editor/Sunday at The Seattle Times and holds the Knight chair in journalism at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Her series, “AIDS in…

‘You can break the action at times and give us background.’Say you’re writing about the Little League team winning the Little League World Series and you’re doing a narrative. That’s…

Those who do it well explain what it is they do.

‘The center of the onion is what you want.’

“Whether it is fiction or nonfiction, the voice of the author is what keeps us going. If the voice does not capture the reader, the voice is silenced by the…

Emily Hiestand is a poet and a visual artist as well as a magical essayist. A lot of what she talked about can be summarized as thinking like an artist…

Nieman Narrative Journalism ConferenceCambridge, MassachusettsNovember 30 – December 2, 2001Narrative journalism is in transition to a second phase. The first continues—the individual, dramatic phase in which lonely reporters get fascinated…

‘Without them, the stuff that happens would float around in some glob and none of it would mean anything.’