That's what I love about history - nuance. I don't believe in unalloyed heroes. Everyone's got warts, and everyone's got a surprise… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“I will be on the look out for you, my dear girl," he wrote. "You must expect to give yourself up when… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
At some point, I stumbled across my two main protagonists: William E. Dodd, a mild-mannered professor of history picked by Roosevelt to… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I'd always been interested in maritime history, especially the great liners. I'd have done a book about the Titanic if it hadn't… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“Let me explain how such a thing might occasionally happen,' Goebbels said. 'All during the twelve years of the Weimar Republic our… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
It's not my intent to write definitive history. 'Dead Wake' isn't a definitive history of the sinking of the Lusitania. It's my… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“There began to appear before my romantic eyes...a vast and complicated network of espionage, terror, sadism and hate, from which no one,… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
A writer could spend years reading already-published books just to gain a grasp of the historical terrain. — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
My goal is to produce as rich and historical an experience for the reader as I possibly can, to the point where… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
Room 40 knew a U-boat was heading south to Liverpool - knew the boat's history; knew that it was now somewhere in… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
Yes, William E. Dodd was the - became the - America's first ambassador to Nazi Germany. Prior to that, he was a… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I read a book called 'Transatlantic', which is a history of the great shipping lines. Also, of course, I had read about… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I started reading the big histories and the small histories, the memoirs and so forth. At some point, I found the diary… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“This is the story of Isaac and his time in America, the last turning of the centuries, when the hubris of men… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
It was so easy to disappear, so easy to deny knowledge, so very easy in the smoke and din to mask that… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I've heard from the movie marketplace that James Cameron did such a killer job with 'Titanic' that it's almost impossible to do anything better. — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
As a rule, I am very skeptical of tying books to anniversaries. I don't think readers care. I also feel that it just about… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“look as if they had been plucked from the Palace of Versailles or a Jacobean mansion—that you were aboard a ship being propelled far… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
That's what I love about history - nuance. I don't believe in unalloyed heroes. Everyone's got warts, and everyone's got a surprise side. — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“Holmes was charming and gracious, but something about him made Belknap uneasy. He could not have defined it. Indeed, for the next several decades… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
. . . why some men choose to fill their brief allotment of time engaging the impossible, others in the manufacture of sorrow. — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“At present," he said, "I am responsible for conveying my associates to a place called Chicago. I understand it is somewhere in the hinterland.” — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I knew from an online search that the Wisconsin State Historical Society, on the vast University of Wisconsin campus, held the papers of Sigrid… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
Dodd continued to hope that the murders would so outrage the German public that the regime would fall, but as the days passed he… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
I envy other writers who claim to have a backlog of books they'd like to write. — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
Trying to find ideas is the hardest part of my job. You'd think it would be the most fun. Just sitting around reading whatever… — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
“Her blind endorsement of Hitler’s regime first faded to a kind of sympathetic skepticism, but as summer approached,” — Erik Larson Copy Share Image
