Reporter : a memoir
(Book)

Includes index.

"A memoir of renowned investigative journalist Seymour Hersh's life as a reporter"--

"From the Pulitzer-prize-winning, bestselling author and preeminent investigative journalist of our time--an intensely personal, revelatory memoir of a matchless career that has encompassed the most important stories of the last half century. Seymour M. Hersh's fearless reporting has earned him fame, front-page bylines in virtually every major newspaper in the free world, a staggering collection of awards, and no small amount of controversy. His story is, first and foremost, a story of fierce independence. Faced with pressure from corporate interests, the various muscular arms of government, and occasionally from outright criminals, Hersh has been relentless in his pursuit of truth and his belief in challenging the official narrative. We learn how he navigated through cover-ups, deceit, and ethical dilemmas in the morasses of war, espionage, and politics. He brings to light previously unknown details of his reporting on the atrocity at My Lai and the military's efforts to save face. He revisits the Watergate scandal; the CIA's missteps in Chile, Cuba, Panama, and elsewhere; the duplicity of Henry Kissinger and Dick Cheney; and the path that took him to the revelations about Abu Ghraib. We come to see which lines he would cross and which he would not, how he employed the tools available to him, why the use of anonymous sources is vital to a free press, and why those sources must be protected at all costs. This book is an object lesson in reporting in its highest form. Hersh takes us from his youth on the South Side of Chicago, through the halcyon days of American newspaper journalism, to his eventual stints at The New York Times, The New Yorker, and beyond. Along the way, he offers illuminating recollections about some of the giants of American journalism: Ben Bradlee, A.M. Rosenthal, David Remnick, William Shawn, and Bob Woodward among them. In a time when good journalism--if not truth itself--is under fire as never before, Reporter is essential reading on the power of the printed word."

Faced with pressure from corporate interests, governments, and outright criminals, Hersh has been relentless in pursuit of truth and his belief in challenging the official narrative. Here he takes us from his youth on the South Side of Chicago, through the halcyon days of American newspaper journalism, and through the morasses of war, espionage, and politics. Hersh also discusses the lines he would cross and which he would not, why the use of anonymous sources is vital to a free press, and why those sources must be protected at all costs. In a time when good journalism-- if not truth itself-- is under fire, this is essential reading on the power of the printed word. -- adapted from jacket.