How do Pulitzer-winning journalists do their work? In interviews and public talks, many have spoken about their research, reporting and writing processes. As the 2020 prize contest deadline approaches — entries will be accepted through Jan. 24, 2020, including in the new Audio Reporting category — look back at their words of wisdom.
Persist, Relentlessly
David Barstow won the 2019 Explanatory Reporting Prize with New York Times colleagues Susanne Craig and Russ Buettner — his fourth award. Advising students at his alma mater, Northwestern’s Medill School, he distilled the formula for producing quality journalism into “two basic ingredients”:
“You need abnormal curiosity, and you need relentless persistence. If you have those two things, you can do really great journalism. And if you don’t, no number of journalism classes will get you there.”
Poynter interviewed Julie Tate of The Washington Post, noting her research contributions to nine Prize-winning portfolios. Speaking about this fundamental skill, she echoed Barstow’s sentiment on the importance of persistence.
“Research, like reporting, is always made stronger by going back and back and back to what you have found,” Tate said.
Lose Yourself in the Story
The late Anthony Shadid, Washington Post correspondent and 2004 International Reporting winner, took an immersive approach to the news. GQ quoted him as saying, “You basically lose yourself in it. You take a deep breath and sink into it. The story becomes you. It defines your life in a way I've never experienced elsewhere.
“The downside to that is, it takes a bit of your soul away. You're thinking about the story constantly. How do I understand that story, how do I put the pieces of the puzzle together?”
Lean on Colleagues
Jodi Kantor, who with Megan Twohey was named as a 2018 Public Service winner, stressed the importance of the pair’s highly collaborative working relationship in an interview with The Cut.
“Not only were we in constant communication with each other and not only did we compare notes, check judgment, and plot strategy on those matters great and small, but the weight of this reporting is such that you just need somebody to share it with. A lot of the stories we heard are incredibly disturbing, and you don’t want to carry those alone.”
Know Your Purpose
E.R. Shipp of the New York Daily News and Jeffrey Gettelman of The New York Times stressed their sense of purpose, in interviews with Afro and Seven Days, respectively.
“The role of writers is to be the griots,” Shipp said, referring to the African oral tradition of storytelling. “We are the ones who have the memories of what has been … we are teaching people about the past and what is happening now.”
“I do risk my life a lot in doing this job. It's not really about the glory, though that can be nice. It's more that I want to try to help people who are experiencing famine or really horrific abuses,” Gettelman said.
Pause ...
Brigid Schulte, a member of the Washington Post team that won in Breaking News Reporting in 2008, advises pausing despite the breakneck pace many reporters strive for when uncovering or piecing together a story.
“Just stop. Even for a moment. Look up out of the tunnel. Breathe. Begin to create open space to remember who you are, what’s important to you and where it is you want to go rather than racing faster and faster, going nowhere, in the dark,” she said in Medium.
Seek Truth
Katherine Boo, 2000 Public Service winner and current Pulitzer Board member, spoke of her pursuit of truth in an interview with Bill Gates' Gates Notes:
“As a documentary journalist, I don’t see my role as lecturing governments or international development people about what they should do. Rather, I’m trying to give an unsentimental, rigorously reported account of how government policy or market forces affect lives and prospects on the so-called ground — not least because I think that’s information conscientious policymakers and philanthropists long for, and often lack.”
In an essay for Pulitzer.org, Boo touched on one of the key skills for a reporter: listening. "What should a reporter do in the face of grudging concern? Speak solely to those with good teeth and clean urine?" she pondered. Read the full text of that piece, “On Not Giving Voice to the Voiceless,” here.
For full details on entering the 2020 Pulitzer Prize contest in Journalism, visit the How to Enter page, here.