Until a few days ago I had never heard of Robert Caro but the title of his recently published book - "Working: Researching, Interviewing, Writing" - intrigued me. I've spent much of my working life doing those three things and I'm always interested to know how other people do them.
Caro is a highly respected journalist who, now in his eighties, is still working on the fifth volume of his biography of Lyndon Johnson and previously wrote a biography of Robert Moses. This book is a collection of pieces in which he describes the background to his writing - his motivation and the way he works.
Caro began by wanting to explore the nature of political power: he didn't set out to write biographies but saw this as the most interesting way to investigate this topic, focusing on the role of a single man who exercised great power, and considering its source. Not (yet) having read either biography, I can't assess how far he achieved this ambition but the diligence he exercised in his research is hugely impressive.
His account of working with documentary sources is amazing. His description of the Lyndon Johnson library and the colossal number of files held there is very vivid. The prospect of investigating them would be daunting for anyone less committed than Caro but with the help of his wife Ina he tackled the task. His research was meticulous. These days, when so many archives are available online, one might think it would be easier to do such work but Caro's description of working with documents illustrates the importance to a researcher of the feel and look of the originals. I noticed this myself when working on the Cadbury archive: looking at digitised documents is undoubtedly convenient but it is very different from holding the paper in your hands, seeing hand-written annotations, and this prompts different ways of thinking about the context in which the documents were produced and their meaning for those who produced them and read them.
His interviewing was equally diligent. Just tracking down the people who could provide him with the most useful insights took immense effort and great determination: researchers who complain about difficulties in accessing interviewees could learn a lot from Caro. And he is a very persistent interviewer, braving the irritation this caused to some of his influential interviewees.
Caro had no funding to do this work. He realised quite early on that working as a journalist and writing in his spare time was not an effective way to undertake such big projects. His first publisher made him a small advance but eventually his wife sold their house to support his work. It took a while before they were in position to feel more financially secure. This didn't prevent them from moving from New York to Texas to understand Johnson's background and to get closer to the people who could tell him about Johnson. This is an astonishing commitment to the project.
I found this book quite fascinating. Caro is a great storyteller and a fine researcher. Anyone interested in researching, interviewing and writing should read it.
