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Robert Caro – The master biographer reflects at 91
The Robert Caro interview.
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Timestamps
(00:00:00) – How Caro gets people to talk
(00:05:03) – Does America need a little more Moses today?
(00:12:42) – Moses the young idealist
(00:17:57) – Watching Moses lose power
(00:24:01) – Did Moses realize he was changing?
(00:27:53) – Building during the Great Depression
(00:32:51) – The threats and promises of Lyndon Johnson
(00:36:08) – Could Kennedy have passed Johnson’s laws?
(00:41:00) – Getting a book down to one sentence
(00:46:21) – All the material that never made it into the books
(00:52:59) – Loneliness
Transcript
00:00:00 – How Caro gets people to talk
Dwarkesh Patel
“If you do everything, you will win.” That is the maxim by which Lyndon Johnson lived his life. My guest today is Robert Caro. Over the 50 years that he has spent writing about Lyndon Johnson, he has lived in the edges of the Texas Hill Country to understand the poverty and loneliness of Johnson’s youth. He has sifted through millions of documents in the Senate and presidential libraries of the entire nation. He has chased down for interviews everyone, from the former goon who helped Johnson steal an election to the chauffeur who drove him on his first desperate campaign.
In other words, my guest today is a man who understands Johnson’s aphorism: “If you do everything, you’ll win.” Mr. Caro, it is such a huge honor to have you on the show.
Robert Caro
It’s great to be here.
Dwarkesh Patel
My first question is what I hinted at in the introduction. How much do you see yourself represented in Johnson or in Moses? Is part of the reason you’re able to write so compellingly about them that you share some of their qualities?
Robert Caro
Let me say first, I think