Tracy Kidder
Tracy Kidder
John Tracy Kidderis an American writer of nonfiction books. He received the Pulitzer Prize for his The Soul of a New Machine, about the creation of a new computer at Data General Corporation. He has received praise and awards for other works, including his biography of Paul Farmer, a doctor and anthropologist, titled Mountains Beyond Mountains...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNon-Fiction Author
Date of Birth12 November 1945
CountryUnited States of America
Tracy Kidder quotes about
advantages began book came dreadful haiti help imagine recently time
At the time I began writing the book about Northampton, I had recently been in Haiti to do a story for the New Yorker. I don't think I would previously have been able to imagine a place as dreadful as Haiti, and when I came back I couldn't help but think about the advantages we have in this place.
book invite readers stage tried
I wanted some way to invite readers in, to set the stage for the book - and I tried many different things.
book organization lap
I never planned on doing a book about Paul Farmer or his organization. I met him in Haiti when I was on a magazine assignment. It's almost like his story sort of fell in my lap.
book good-day writing
At first, I spend about four hours a day writing. Toward the end of a book, I spend up to 16 hours a day on it, because all I want to do is make it good and get it done.
book writing effort
I tell beginning readers to read a lot and write a lot. If you want to write a book, find a subject that's really worth the time and effort you'll put in.
book writing want
I always want to write something better than the last book.
book writing sick-world
I usually write about ordinary people and ordinary things, but Paul Farmer is the least ordinary person I've ever met... He's the leader of a small group of people who hope to cure a sick world, and I hope my book can help in some small way.
imposing landscape means order painting
Painting the landscape was, in a sense, another means of exerting control, of imposing order on the disorderly.
brilliance charity degree idealism public witnessed
PIH combines idealism and brilliance to a degree I've never witnessed before in the public charity arena,
adolescent feeling incredibly late safer truck
From my experience, sure, if you were a truck driver, you could be incredibly unlucky, ... But I had the feeling that I was safer than I would have been back here as a late adolescent with a car.
convince convincing crucible everybody great months trying war
For months I'd been trying to convince myself, by convincing everybody back home, that in the crucible of war I'd made that great transition,
leaves suspicious
I'm a little suspicious of the great, overarching view. It always leaves something out.
authors hearing john journalism kept novels rage tom written
New Journalism was such the rage with authors like Tom Wolfe and John McPhee. All I kept hearing was that non-fiction was so much more interesting than the novels being written at that time.
returning seems town wonder
Returning to Northampton, I thought: here's a town that seems to be working pretty well, and I wonder why.