Thursday, February 05, 2009
The Controversy Over Kabul
There has been a lot of controversy over the issue of honesty in the portrayal of Mohammed in "The Bookseller of Kabul," however, I think the only person who has truly been honest in the whole ordeal is Seierstad, the author. She said very matter-of-factly that she wasn't surprised that Mohammed was upset because she thought he was expecting "a biography of a hero." Mohammed claimed that he was misrepresented in the book. I think that the only reason he thinks there was misrepresentation is because he miht not have been shone in the best light. As a journalist, it was Seierstad's job to report on everything she saw. If she saw an imperfect human in Mohammed, then it was her right and duty to write that. Of course, I will not be able to truly side with either Mohammed or Seierstad until I finish reading "Bookseller."
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2 comments:
You definitely make a valid point about her journalistic duties. However, I think she definitely aired more than his "imperfections." It seemed, from the documents, that she used strong and possibly overblown language in the first print of the book. I agree she should not have portrayed him as perfect since he was not. But there has to be a middle ground between simply revealing his true actions and making him out to be a generally awful person.
While Seierstad has the duty to report what she witnesses, we still expect reporters to reveal information at their discretion, especially if the information is private or potentially harmful to one's reputation. In this case, Seierstad may have been relating imporant events, but her method of portraying her hosts was a little unethical considering how much artistic lisence she had to take. She did speak with her hosts, but surely not enough so that she could know their every thought, yet she assumes that she does with acceptable accuracy for the purpose of telling her story. As a reporter, she might have wanted to portray Mohammed in a more truthful light by not assuming so much about him.
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