Get the Picture - by John G Morris (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

How do photojournalists get the pictures that bring us the action from the world's most dangerous places? How do picture editors decide which photos to scrap and which to feature on the front page?

Find out in Get the Picture, a personal history of fifty years of photojournalism by one of the top journalists of the twentieth century. John G. Morris brought us many of the images that defined our era, from photos of the London air raids and the D-Day landing during World War II to the assassination of Robert Kennedy. He tells us the inside stories behind dozens of famous pictures like these, which are reproduced in this book, and provides intimate and revealing portraits of the men and women who shot them, including Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and W. Eugene Smith. A firm believer in the power of images to educate and persuade, Morris nevertheless warns of the tremendous threats posed to photojournalists today by increasingly chaotic wars and the growing commercialism in publishing, the siren song of money that leads editors to seek pictures that sell copies rather than those that can change the way we see the world.

From the Back Cover

How do photojournalists get the pictures that bring us the action from the world's most dangerous places? Find out in Get the Picture, a personal history of fifty years of photojournalism by one of the top journalists of the twentieth century. John G. Morris brought us many of the images that defined our era, from photos of the London air raids and the D-Day landing during World War II to the assassination of Robert Kennedy. He tells us the inside stories behind dozens of famous pictures like these, which are reproduced in this book, and provides intimate and revealing portraits of the men and women who shot them, including Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and W. Eugene Smith.

Review Quotes

"Going through Morris's book of memories, I felt I was sitting in front of a magic lantern."

--Henri Cartier-Bresson

"Morris has a clear-eyed, detached perspective on his former role as one of the key arbiters of taste for such publications as Life, the Washington Post, and the New York Times. . . . He was one of a handful of top picture editors with the power to shape Americans' collective memory of world events, from the London air raids for WWII to school desegregation."

-- "Kirkus Reviews"

"Morris was feisty and controversial . . . and he tells his story engagingly and excitingly. . . . A fascinating read."-- "Booklist"

"[Morris] weaves photographers, anecdotes, players, history and a credo or two into an engaging and informative tale."

--Rosemary Ranck "New York Times Book Review"

"His best stories from the field are not tagging along with Capa and Hemingway . . . or having drinks at the Ritz in Paris with Marlene Dietrich; they are his less flashy but moving descriptions of the Japanese internment camps in California."

--Leslie Cockburn "Los Angeles Times Book Review"

"James G. Morris describes himself as a journalist, yet not a writer or a photographer. He has spent a lifetime organizing photographers. For more than 50 years, he has commissioned, cajoled and cared about that unusual breed--the photojournalist. Get the Picture is his richly illustrated personal account of a life that leads us from the heady days at Life (first as Hollywood correspondent, then, through the turbulent years of the second world war, as London picture editor) via the executive editorship of the legendary Magnum Photos, and positions as picture editor at The Ladies Home Journal, The Washington Post and The New York Times. A glance at the index gives some indication of the extraordinary world Morris lived through."--David Wason "Times Higher Education Supplement"

About the Author

John G. Morris is a University of Chicagoan who served as a Hollywood correspondent for Life, picture editor for Life's London bureau during World War II, picture editor at Ladies' Home Journal, the first executive editor of the Magnum Photos press agency, picture editor for both the Washington Post and the New York Times, and a correspondent and editor for National Geographic.