Robert Capa (Endre Ern? Friedmann)
[Photographer, b. 1913, Budapest, Hungary, d. 1954, Thai Binh, Vietnam.]
The [concentration camps] were swarming with photographers and every new picture of horror served only to diminish the total effect. Now, for a short day, everyone will see what happened to those poor devils in those camps; tomorrow, very few will care what happens to them in the future.
Watch out for labels. They are reassuring but somebody’s going to stick one on you that you’ll never get rid of—“the little surrealist photographer.” You'll be lost—you’ll get precious and mannered. Take instead the label of “photojournalist” and keep the other thing for yourself, in your heart of hearts.
(Warning to Henri Cartier-Bresson)
I had it bad. The empty camera trembled in my hands. It was a new kind of fear shaking my body from toe to hair, and twisting my face.
(Remembrance of landing on Omaha Beach, D-Day.)
Writing the truth being so obviously difficult, I have in the interests of it allowed myself to go sometimes beyond and slightly this side of it. All events and persons in this book are accidental and have something to do with the truth.
(On first edition dust jacket of Slightly Out of Focus)
