“It is perhaps an ugly comment on the American press, but the function of the interviewer on most newspapers is to entertain, not to shed light. . . . An interviewer soon begins to judge public figures on the basis of their entertainment value, overlooking their true importance. It is not easy to get an interview with Professor Franz Boas, the greatest anthropologist in the world, across a city desk, but a mild interview with Oom the Omnipotent will hit the bottom of page one under a two-column head. . . . It is safe to write accurately only about the nuts and bums. When a public figure does something ridiculous reporters may then write about him accurately.”

“She nodded, jotting something in her notebook.You’re writing that down? Has the interview started?”Lee, whenever you’re talking to a reporter, you’re being interviewed.”

“Austrian public-opinion pollsters recently reported that those held in highest esteem by most of the people interviewed are neither the great artists nor the great scientists, neither the great statesmen nor the great sport figures, but those who master a hard lot with their heads held high.”

“Interview? Oh don't be ridiculous.”

“Writing a novel is actually searching for victims. As I write I keep looking for casualties. The stories uncover the casualties."(Interview in Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews, Eighth Series, ed. George Plimpton, 1988)”

“The reporters who came to the press conference in theoffice of the John Galt Line were young men who hadbeen trained to think that their job consisted ofconcealing from the world the nature of its events.It was their daily duty to serve as audience for somepublic figure who made utterances about the public good,in phrases carefully chosen to convey no meaning.It was their daily job to sling words together in anycombination they pleased, so long as the words did notfall into a sequence saying something specific.They could not understand the interview now beinggiven to them.”