David Talbot Quotes

Publishing is a business, but journalism never was and is not essentially a business. Nor is it a profession.

Journalism is a kind of profession, or craft, or racket, for people who never wanted to grow up and go out into the real world.

I became a journalist because one didn't have to specialise.

It took me years to realize I wanted to be in journalism.

I always wanted to be part of the media. I knew I wanted to work as a journalist.

That's a paradox I've noticed, too: The news business held little romance for me, yet writing about it somehow stirred my affections.

A career in journalism suddenly lost its appeal.

Journalism: A profession whose business is to explain to others what it personally does not understand.

I knew I was going to be a journalist when I was eight years old and I saw the printing presses rolling at the Sydney newspaper where my dad worked as a proofreader.

Journalism is not just a cause, it's also a wacky profession.

I liked journalism and thought it was important, certainly more important than fiction. I'd probably still be doing it if I hadn't been elbowed out.

A news-writer is a man without virtue who lies at home for his own profit.

I accept the media for what they are. Most of them are really good people. Some of them are scumbags.

Before I ever heard about '60 Minutes,' I had been a writer, a columnist for 'Life' magazine and for 'Newsweek' - that was about as high as you could get in column writing. I care about my writing. I'm not a quack-quack TV journalist.

I wanted to be a journalist so the character of a TV news person in 'Run Baby Run' was really interesting.

I'm a recovering journalist, I should say.

The function of good journalism is to take information and add value to it.

American journalism (like the journalism of any other country) is predominantly paltry and worthless. Its pretensions are enormous, but its achievements are insignificant.

We have to compete in a universe of 200 networks, so we have to carve out our own niche, and to me, that niche is just basic shoe-leather journalism with some good journalists at the helm you can trust as presenters.

Most people would think if you're the prime news anchor, then you should sort of be this Edward R. Murrow, Clark Kent guy with the family and 2.5 kids - or the perky, cute yet smart Katie Couric.

I've had a lot of fun, and when I talk to kids in journalism schools, I say, look, I know what the journalism teachers tell you that this is a great way to perform public service and all that, but I say the main reason, if you decide what you want to do is be a reporter, the main reason you want to do it is because it's just so much fun.

Many people would no more think of entering journalism than the sewage business - which at least does us all some good.

When I left Toronto and entered journalism in the late 1990s, I had many notions about the news business, nearly all of them wrong, as it turned out.

I grew up with 'The Denver Post' and the 'Golden Transcript.' There was never a moment that I thought I'd work at the 'New York Times.' My goal, starting out, was just to see if I could be a journalist.

My father was a journalist.