Carl Hiaasen Quotes

I guess because I'm a washed-up journalist, I always do a lot of research.

I didn't like being in a newsroom all the time.

Journalism: an ability to meet the challenge of filling the space.

I was not very good at newspaper reporting. I'm just not quick enough, and I always tend to tell things as stories.

I am a hard-news journalist. That is what I do.

Report, report, report. Dig, dig, dig. Think, think, think. Don't stop being a reporter because you've become a columnist.

What could I have possibly learned except the really most important thing, which is that I did not want to work at the 'New York Times'? Beyond that, I learned how a newspaper works.

Writing a nonfiction story is like cracking a safe. It seems impossible at the beginning, but once you're in, you're in.

I'd been in journalism about two weeks when I realized I would do just about anything to avoid writing, and over the years, I have.

People often talk about parachute journalism, but one of the skills that you get when you are a correspondent is the ability to look at facts fast and work out what the story is.

Anybody who's spent thirteen or fourteen years in print journalism has a lot of stories he thinks were inwardly satisfying as far as preparation, understanding, and diligence.

I write and teach creative nonfiction. I was a reporter.

A big part of reporting is just being present. You have to show up ten days in a row to get the one telling detail.

I work like every journalist works so I have recordings, I have notes.

As a journalist, the details always tell the story.

There's nothing more painful than writing.

I'm in the reporting part of journalism.

As a print journalist, you can be frustrated by people who don't call you back, parts of the story you can't get. TV gets you access to everyone because people call you back. It also allows you to satisfy your curiosity. I am a very curious person.

I began learning the sportswriting business very early in life.

Journalist: a person without any ideas but with an ability to express them; a writer whose skill is improved by a deadline: the more time he has, the worse he writes.

Journalism is literature in a hurry.

Journalism makes you think fast. You have to speak to people in all walks of life. Especially local journalism.

From journalism I learned to write under pressure, to work with deadlines, to have limited space and time, to conduct and interview, to find information, to research, and above all, to use language as efficiently as possible and to remember always that there is a reader out there.

When I worked in Los Angeles covering hard news, very often when something important would happen I'd be off in the woods covering something unimportant, which was more interesting to me.

As an old reporter, we have a few secrets, and the first thing is we try the phone book.