Hitler was such an anomalous character – he was so over-the-top chaotic in his approach to statesmanship, his manner and in the violence which overwhelmed the country initially. I think diplomats around the world… felt like something like that simply would not be tolerated by the people of Germany. Erik Larson Read Quote
Isaac Cline was a creature of his times. He embodied the hubris of his times and, in many ways, was a victim of the storm, not just in material ways – loss of a family member and damage to the town – but also in metaphoric terms. Erik Larson Read Quote
As a rule, I am very skeptical of tying books to anniversaries. I don’t think readers care. I also feel that it just about guarantees that somebody else will be writing a book on the same subject, but being a former journalist, I’m always interested in, like, why write about something today? Why do it now? Erik Larson Read Quote
It was David McCullough’s ‘The Johnstown Flood’ that lit my imagination as to how I might one day go about writing book-length nonfiction, though my favorite of his books is ‘Mornings on Horseback,’ about the young Teddy Roosevelt. Erik Larson Read Quote
When I’m considering an idea, and there is an element of hubris involved, I generally feel comfortable that it’s going to be a good story. Pride goeth before a fall. It’s an element of a lot of big stories. Erik Larson Read Quote
I went to public school on Long Island, and it seemed every year we were being taught that you had a right to a fair trial and a right to confront your accuser. Erik Larson Read Quote
At some point, I stumbled across my two main protagonists: William E. Dodd, a mild-mannered professor of history picked by Roosevelt to be America’s first ambassador to Nazi Germany, and Dodd’s comely and rather wild daughter, Martha, who at first was enthralled with the so-called Nazi revolution. Erik Larson Read Quote
To me, nuclear weapons are the secret crisis of our time. Frankly, everyone needs to reread John Hersey’s ‘Hiroshima.’ Erik Larson Read Quote
It’s like being involved in a detective story, looking for that thing that nobody else has found. Erik Larson Read Quote
