Author: Robert Caro
Robert Caro is considered the bastion of in-depth journalism and research. His legendary tome, “The Power Broker,” is a 1300 page epic that masquerades as a biography on Robert Moses, but is actually a treatise on how you can accumulate power without holding any prominent position in government. I started it three years ago, made it 400 pages, then my daughter was born… and now it’s back on my reading list for 2021.
Not to be outdone by the multiple awards he got for it, including a Pulitzer, he then decided to produce the most in-depth biography of Lyndon B. Johnson. In fact, it’s so in-depth, the fifth volume is still being written (with each volume weighing in between 500-1200 pages). Again, more awards and yet another Pulitzer.
Which brings us to this book.
It’s a series of essays he wanted to produce and get out to the world as a semi-memoir because… well… he’s getting up in his years and doesn’t know if he’ll have time to release it.
Diving into his mind was a fascinating behind-the-scenes look on what it really takes to produce high quality content. It was a refreshing change from the constant bombardment of advice to “produce quickly” and shows the depth he lovingly takes into non-fiction, where the fad today is to produce a chapter of a good idea, followed by padded out fluff to meet a word count.
He speaks about wanting to understand how power functions, how it works, how to get it and how to wield it and found no greater example than Moses and Johnson.
Caro chronicles the years he took to write The Power Broker, going broke while writing it (he thought it would only take him nine months), but committed to seeing it to the end. He reflects on actually moving to Texas to be around the people Johnson grew up with so he can have a true understanding of what his upbringing was like. He also details the endless hours of research him and his wife spend in libraries and archives, turning over every single page.
If you’ve read all of this before, there might not be enough in this book to entice you. Much of this information can be collated through various interviews and sources freely found online.
However, if you haven’t gone down those rabbit holes and want to get a full appreciation for somebody dedicated to their craft, this is the book to pick up.