|
|
|
|
|
A
Girl's Best Friend? Some guys, when they get jilted by their fiancée, sit in front of Sports Center for days on end or hit up iTunes and make the mother of all mixes in an effort to win their girl back. Not Tom Zoellner. He took out his frustrations on the diamond industry, and the rest of us are better off for it. The result is The Heartless Stone, a comprehensive study of the history of diamonds in the American courtship ritual -- and when Big Marketing started fueling the fire. (Hint: It appears they lit the match...) Below Zoellner speaks about traveling the globe to research this controversial and somewhat secretive industry.
The Heartless Stone A_P: The press materials for The Heartless Stone explain in detail the back story that motivated your creation of the book, but they don't say much about the skills and training required to create expository writing of this level of detail. How did you do the following: 1. Find the people who could give you access to places like mines near Bangui? TZ: Very few people speak English in the Central African Republic, and so I employed a translator whose email and phone number I had been given before leaving the U.S. He spoke the local languages and had lots of friends, and he helped immensely. It was then only a matter of being persistent and willing to spend the money to rent a Land Cruiser to get into the back country. The same principle applied elsewhere in the world: hire a translator, have a sense of humor and be persistent until you get your answers. 2. Convince companies like Diamonds North and De Beers to grant you visits and interviews with their staff? TZ: You can obtain a huge amount of information and access just by calling up and asking. In the case of De Beers, I emailed a few weeks ahead and told them I was writing a book about the industry, and would they mind speaking in person with me? They were exceptionally polite and even invited me into their selling office in London to see the legendary "sight rooms." In the case of Diamonds North, I asked them if I could spend a week in their Arctic camp and they said fine. I paid my own way up there and they let me see just about everything I wanted to see. A_P: What journalistic carrot or stick did you wield? TZ: No carrots or sticks involved. Nobody got any special treatment. A_P: Who financed the travel and related expenses for the book? St. Martin's? Self-financed? TZ: I did get an advance, but most of the trip was self-financed. Credit cards are a wonderful thing. A_P: One of the things that makes this book so effective is the level of detail you provide when describing the places and people you encountered during your research. Seriously, how do you know the difference between Spruce trees and Jack Pines? Do you keep a journal when you travel, recording every detail, or do you research pre- or post-visit and fill in blanks? TZ: I tried to take as many notes as possible in the field and then if something was unclear when I returned home, I then could call around to the experts and make sure I had gotten things right. A_P: You've reported for a few prestigious media companies. Which of your previous reporting positions gave you the skill set or background knowledge most important to producing a book of this caliber? TZ: Nothing is more important than raw curiosity, and the consequent willingness to embarrass yourself or become uncomfortable in the pursuit of the truth. This is something that is (or should be) taught at any small newspaper where the editor won't stand for an evasive or partial version of the facts. And so I'd say all the skills I needed were picked up at my college newspaper, where we did regular battle with PR-minded administrators. Taking private offense when somebody tells you a lie is not a bad quality to have as a journalist. You also have to refuse to take "no" for an answer when you're in the right. "No" is a temporary annoyance. And in the final analysis, "no" means nothing. A_P: Do you hope this book will stem some of the apparently irrational demand for diamonds in the United States? Do you think that's even possible? How do you combat a "tradition" that is so ingrained in American culture? TZ: There is a kind of slow-boiling insanity when it comes to diamonds, and this has been so far inculcated into the Western mindset that it may never go away. I didn't want to be prescriptive with this book, or tell people they were bad people for liking diamonds. I only wanted to lay out the facts as I found them and let people make up their own minds. I could talk about my own choice in the matter, though, and that was to finally get rid of the diamond ring that had been left over from my broken engagement. I don't think I could buy another diamond again. A_P: What else should people know about this book, the production of this book, or diamonds in general? TZ: Only to offer some encouragement to other writers and journalists. With so many newspapers going the way of brevity over depth, it's easy to forget that writing the long big stories is more important now than it has ever been. The story behind the story -- the truth of the patterns that hide behind the events -- will always remain interesting and meaningful, as well as a pleasure to write and to read. Human beings have an insatiable thirst for the truth, which is often complex and nuanced and requires great amounts of space to express. Readers will always stick with you if you deliver the goods. In this sense, I'm an optimist about the future of the written word. Tom Zoellner has worked as a contributing editor for Men’s Health and as a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle. More on this book can be found at www.theheartlessstone.com.
R A Miller is the
Managing Editor of Arriviste Press.
The Heartless Stone |
 |
|
