Leslie Cockburn

I started making little films with a 16 mm camera as an undergraduate at Yale. My first job out of college was 'assistant editor' on a forgettable low budget feature.

When you have a situation that's destructive, when there's tremendous inhumanity everywhere, you see how humanity survives in all of its different permutations.

Journalism, for me, has always been a calling. There are things that must be exposed to the light, truths that must be uncovered, stories worth risking your life for.

After reading Graham Greene and Joseph Conrad when I was a student at Yale, I wanted to live in the world they captured in their books. I had had some experience living in Africa. I was drawn to that kind of adventure.

When you are on assignment, you stick to the facts, limit your vision, and often cut out the most revealing material. There is no texture, no shades of gray. In fiction, you can bring the reader on the perilous journey with your characters as they discover that war is more like a wilderness of mirrors, full of danger and uncertainty.