Reporter

A Memoir

By: Seymour M. Hersh

Narrated by: Arthur Morey

Length: 13 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's summary

A Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2018.

A Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year.

"Reporter is just wonderful. Truly a great life, and what shines out of the book, amid the low cunning and tireless legwork, is Hersh's warmth and humanity. This book is essential reading for every journalist and aspiring journalist the world over." (John le Carre)

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning, best-selling author and preeminent investigative journalist of our time - a heartfelt, hugely revealing memoir of a decades-long career breaking some of the most impactful stories of the last half century, from Washington to Vietnam to the Middle East.

Seymour Hersh's fearless reporting has earned him fame, front-page bylines in virtually every major newspaper in the free world, honors galore, and no small amount of controversy. Now in this memoir he describes what drove him and how he worked as an independent outsider, even at the nation's most prestigious publications. He tells the stories behind the stories - riveting in their own right - as he chases leads, cultivates sources, and grapples with the weight of what he uncovers, daring to challenge official narratives handed down from the powers that be.

In telling these stories, Hersh divulges previously unreported information about some of his biggest scoops, including the My Lai massacre and the horrors at Abu Ghraib. There are also illuminating recollections of some of the giants of American politics and journalism: Ben Bradlee, A. M. Rosenthal, David Remnick, and Henry Kissinger among them. This is essential listening on the power of the printed word at a time when good journalism is under fire as never before.

©2018 Seymour M. Hersh (P)2018 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“A master class in the craft of reporting." (Alan Rusbridger, The New York Times Book Review)

“Reporter is a miracle.... The stories brim with humor, wit, poignancy, pointillist portraits of brilliant color - above all, [Hersh's] own voice.” (Andrew Meier, Bookforum)

A Great Memoir

Since I am a near contemporary of Hersh, I loved this view of our history.

Informative

Great narration, interesting hearing the perspectives of the investigative journalist who is responsible for so many huge stories being uncovered.

Investigative journalism behind-the-scenes history

It took me months to finish this audio book. I both loved the book and hated the corruption it revealed. The shining America in my mind fragmented and fell into pieces. I was a child or a busy young adult during many of the historic events Seymour Hersh reported on so this was a good way to catch up and learn what happened.

The writing is wonderful and the narration perfect. My interest was held throughout. But, I had to take a break from the book and listen to humor or other distracting fictional books because I was so disappointed in what I was learning. The corruption, the power-hungry, the pathological greed that threaded through the stories was a sad reality. The abuse of civilians in other countries by American soldiers in various wars was disappointing. Raping of women, robbing of families, threatening harm to shake down people for money . . . I was so disheartened by these stories - including murder for entertainment or relief of stress by helicopter pilots in Vietnam . . . so awful.

The early stories of police abuse and killing of black citizens, terrible. But those individual tragedies and injustices were outpaced by the huge and wholesale abuse of American citizens' freedoms and economic rights by those in power.

The book is a wonderful insight into the value of investigative journalism, and I despair that we will have journalists that can afford to be investigative journalists with mainstream media focusing on "talking heads" - or dressed-up people paid big bucks (millions) - to talk on the allowed topics decided on by a few rich and powerful billionaires.

I am glad I listened to this audiobook, although it made me sad to see how the wonderful United States of America has been corrupted wherever power or money is to be had. I admire the author's life work to uncover the truth - and understand his reasons for not revealing everything.

Pretty much what I expected

What I should have expected from a brash old school Chicago reporter who recounts his career from early days as city reporter to his rise as a world renowned investigative journalist who has been involved in exposing many of the most important stories of the last fifty years.

Hersh is very aware of his talents and flaws as well as the way he comes across to people, whether they be bosses, colleagues or targets. He’s pretty full of himself as you would expect but his memoir is driven by the intense love he has for the work he’s done so well. It has to be very frightening to be pursued by this guy once you realize he knows your hiding something.

All in all this comes across as an honest book. He brags but also admits his mistakes and regrets. I’ve followed him since the Sixties and I feel that Reporter serves as a fitting review of a career well reported.

open your eyes and mind. only truth will set us...

I've always been a bit radical in my belief or disbelief of the honesty and integrity of our elected officials. I had good teachers. My brillant older sister Kathy who was a hippy living in the Heate district of SF, with Janis Joplin down the street, always said to me that the American people have no clue what their government is doing. My father, a decorated Marine who served in World War II, forbade me to volunteer at 18 for the Vietnam war. He said "I will personally move you to Canada rather than waste your life in this unjust war."
Thank you Mr. Hirsch for confirming My family's heartfelt insights and beliefs . Share this book with all thinking and even non thinking people that you know. America needs to know!

FREEDOM OF THE PRESS

“Reporter” reveals why freedom of the press is both feared and revered. Seymour Hersh is an investigative reporter. After listening to “Reporter”, one realizes Hersh is among the best journalists of the 20th and 21st century. To many newspaper readers (embarrassingly including this reader) Hersh is not well known. Hersh’s reporting uncovered the My Lai massacre early in his career and followed that with revelations about the clandestine bombing of Cambodia, CIA exposure of domestic spying, and a still controversial contention that Obama lied to the American people about the Abbottabad raid that leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.

Hersh shows no fear or favor but his pursuit of facts gives no value to reasons for misleading public perception of events. This is not criticism of the duties of an investigative reporter, but facts do not always speak for themselves. One knows America’s government has mislead the public many times in its history. Whether that misleading is justified or not is not the concern of reporters like Seymour Hersh. To Hersh, all that matters is–facts speak for themselves. Therein lies the fear of freedom of the press.

The problem with thinking that facts speak for themselves is that all the facts revealed are never all the facts. The many books that have been written about historic figures is ample evidence of the problem. With the principle of facts speak for themselves there would be no revisionist history. History is re-written in every generation.

This is not to denigrate the great work reporters like Hersh provide to Americans. Without freedom of the press America would not be America. Even though all the facts are never known, those that are known should be revealed in real time. How else can American freedom be preserved? Hersh, like all good investigative reporters, is not always on the right side of history. Not because his facts are wrong, but that they fail to tell the whole story.

There is good reason to both fear and revere freedom of the press. Fear comes from truthful as well as false reporting of facts. Freedom is dependent on good reporting by reputable reporters.

Seymour Hersh is an American Treasure

This astounding autobiography chronicles the reporting of one of America’s greatest journalists who discovered and brought to light many of the worst aspects of the United States duplicity and misfeasance in the second half of the Twentieth Century and the start of the 21st. In that time he exposed the lies of our government during the Vietnam War, My Lai, Watergate, the CIA’s spying on Americans, the murder and attempted murder of South Americans and Fidel Castro, the duplicity of the neo-Cons in Iraq and Afghanistan, the failure to utilize Bashar al-Ashad and the Syrian Government in the Middle East and many other issues. He meticulously exposes the anti-American attitudes of the Pentagon and McNamara during Viet Nam, Henry Kissinger during a host of wars and crises, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Helms among others. Hersh achieves his success through hard work, dogged research, cultivation of sources and interviews. He is one of a kind and, in my opinion, deserves the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his work. Of course, that’s not going to happen anytime soon.
A note on the NY Times review of Dwight Garner whom I admire. Mr. Garner misses the point and it’s a shame. He criticizes Mr. Hersh for not writing a fine memoir as he leaves out his family, his relationship with friends such as Bill Bradlee, Daniel Ellsberg, Bob Woodward and I.F. Stone. That’s not the point of the book. This is about reporting and no one really cares how well Bill Bradlee plays tennis or what Daniel Ellsberg likes to drink. Hersh’s interviews with Assad, William Calley and others, Kissinger’s lying and Dick Cheney’s failure to shake his hand speak volumes about Hersh’s conclusions. It is a remarkable story of how many times Hersh has been called a liar by politicians and others only to be vindicated many years later by declassified materials or admissions of witnesses. Richard Nixon’s fairly recently declassified tapes are a perfect example, but only one of many. Hersh’s discussion of his methods and work is fascinating and this book is a historical wonder.

Great narrative on investigative reporting...

...as Seymour Hersh tells it and leads us to the next episode. Where do we go from here?

Excellent from Start to Finish!

Reporter is a fascinating look into investigative journalism, the news business and Seymour Hersh's long career has spanned. Amazing stories about how he got the news and the sources. Written with seriousness and a good dose or dry humour. Very informative and entertaining book. Read beautifully and produced greatly. The book is also a great resource to building a good sense of what is wrong or right with the news today and how can we a build a healthy sense of skepticism when we consume the news. A 10 out of 10 book!

Didn’t want it to end.

The book and production was superlative. Interesting, well laid out and very detailed without being either boring or confusing. My next listen will be another of Mr. Hersh’s books while I wait for the new Trump comic to drop. His one comment about so many awful things that are really just waiting to be discovered that are already sort of in plain sight strikes me as true and tragic. I loved the last bit about what the Cardinal said to him. Thank whomever for people like Mr. Hersh who believe in the value of the truth.