Truman Capote ( whose work I am yet to read but would really like to) was the subject of one of Marcus' lectures on literary journalism. It was noted that Capote's involvement with the criminals who murdered the Clutter family could have jeopardised his ability to produce a fair and unbiased novel, which bought up the question "how deeply involved in the subject can a writer be without becoming bias?"
The question led me to think of Dominick Dunne, and a documentary about his life which I watched recently called 'After The Party'.
Dunne was born in 1925 and served in World War II before moving to Hollywood to work as an actor. He eventually became vice president of Four Star Television and was famous for his legendary parties and Hollywood friends like Humphrey Bogart.
In 1982, his 22 year old daughter Dominique was brutally murdered. This tragic event led Dunne to write " Justice: A Father's Account of the Trial of his Daughter's Killer" for Vanity Fair magazine.
Dunne then went on to cover the trails of OJ Simpson, Claus Von Bulow and Michael Skakel for the magazine and hosted several true crime television shows. He died of bladder cancer in 2009.
Have a look at the clip above from 'After the Party'.
While Dunne is a truly brilliant writer and a fascinating person, I couldn't help but wonder if his coverage of the Simpson Trial and other celebrity crimes could ever be truly objective. After all, wouldn't his daughter's death and the fact her killer was jailed for only 6.5 years have impacted on his ideas about the justice systems and criminals in general? How could someone whose own child was murdered ever remain 'uninvolved' in stories about crime?
Regardless of whether or not Dunne , like Capote, was 'too involved' in his subjects to report in an unbias fashion, it is always a risk for those whose work requires extensive research, interviews with and exposure to the subjects of an article. Have a look at some of Dunne's work below:
LA in the Age of OJ
Imelda in Excile
The Fall of Roberto Polo
