The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington [Paperback]

Robert D. Novak (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 9, 2008

New York Times Bestseller

A landmark achievement

The Prince of Darkness is not simply the stunningly candid memoir of one of the country’s most influential reporters but also a riveting history of the past half century in American politics.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The barbs start flying on page one (Bush critic Joseph Wilson: What an asshole!) and continue to nearly the end (CNN correspondent Ed Henry: duplicitous phony) of this thick memoir by the conservative journalist and pundit. Novak recounts his journey from Associated Press cub reporter through longtime Evans and Novak columnist scooping up Beltway political dirt to ubiquitous talk-show talking head. Along the way he drinks and gambles, battles liberal media bias, wrangles contracts with cable channels, settles scores with critics (more-hawkish-than-thou pundit David Frum is a cheat and a liar), defends his outing of Valerie Plame and tosses in many old columns, which read like a seismograph tracing of political microtremors (Melvin Laird to be Nixon's defense secretary!). More tantalizing are the glimpses of his relations with official sources, who know they won't be attacked in print as long as they give good tips. Novak's insider perspective, vitriolic pen and damn-the-torpedoes frankness make it a lively and eye-opening account of big-foot journalism. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Novak immediately cuts to the chase, beginning this memoir with his first in-person encounter with Joseph Wilson, in the green room of NBC's Meet the Press in 2003. Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, would eventually form the center of a major career-jeopardizing controversy for Novak, who is blunt in his immediate low opinion of the man. And that characteristic bluntness reigns throughout as he recalls 50 years of political reporting. He was working for the Associated Press when he met his mentor, Willard Edwards of the Chicago Tribune, a "diehard right-wing Republican who was part of the Red-hunting establishment." Edwards is only one of the fascinating characters--both reporters and politicos--appearing throughout the book, including John and Bobby Kennedy, George W. Bush, Ted Turner, and Novak's former partner, Rowland Evans. He is frank and unapologetic about his work, his viewpoints, and his personal shortcomings. Ambitious and, for a while, very much a part of the liquor-soaked Washington power scene, Novak neglected his family. True to his conservative beliefs and sentiments, he traces the trajectory of Republican influence and his disagreement with Republican presidents. Novak also traces the growth of Washington from a sleepy town to a power center, prone to treacherous machinations. Having traveled through the chronology of news events of the past 50 years, Novak returns to the Plame Affair, detailing the fallout of his column "outing" Plame as a CIA agent and expresses no regrets. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 672 pages
• Publisher: Three Rivers Press; Reprint edition (September 9, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400052009
• ISBN-13: 978-1400052004
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 1.4 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (90 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #115,925 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #34 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Arts & Literature > Television Performers

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

101 of 113 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Civility, July 16, 2007

By 

David W. Straight (knoxville, tennessee United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington (Hardcover)

Robert Novak is a throwback to a time when being civil to people you
disagreed with was the norm rather than the exception. In many ways this
is a very sad autobiography, since you can see the bleak contrasts to
the current standards where people with different viewpoints are regarded
as "the enemy", and being polite to the enemy is close to treason. But
those same contrasts also make this book essential reading: if there were
more Novaks on the left, right, and middle the country would be much
better off.

Novak is not hesitant to describe his own mistakes and shortcomings--
another stark contrast to most of the current politicians and pundits.
Time and again he relates how various people "used" him in underhanded
ways through carefully selected leaks. Leaks are like Oxycontin--
a drug that can be beneficial, but which can also be very harmful.
Novak, of course, survives on leaks--but he also acknowledges that you
can't criticize your leakers, any more than an addict can attack his
dealer, and I get the sense from the book that he's not entirely happy
with this arrangement--that it's a little bit as though people could buy
you off.

Novak is very candid about his warts, so to speak--smoking, drinking,
fighting, etc, and also very candid about the things that changed his
life, personally and politically, such as his conversion to Catholicism
and his epiphany vis-a-vis Ronald Reagan. Novak is astute, and accepts
that his initial judgements can be mistaken--other qualities lacking in
most politicians and pundits nowadays.

Of particular interest to me were the descriptions of his cable TV work.
Capital Gang was the only political show I could enjoy--and it was my
favorite TV show of any kind. The chemistry was excellent--as Novak
describes--and Novak could take being kidded and could laugh at himself.
There were always plenty of things I disagreed with him on, but the show
would not have been worthwhile without him. My favorite episode, which
most unfortunately is only lightly alluded to in the book, came when
Novak had (on live TV) goaded Mark Shields beyond endurance, and Shields
shouted at Novak "That's [cow manure]!". The Gang looked back and forth
at each other for what seemed like a minute and finally Pat Buchanan said,
plaintively "This is a family show". But that didn't affect the personal
relationship between Novak and Shields. Novak in the book describes other
shouting matches--Novak and Shields, Novak and Al Hunt, Novak and Evans,
etc. He looks candidly at himself in the book--he's not Mother Teresa.

One of the saddest and most disturbing parts of the book comes near the
end, where he is accused by neocons of wanting to see the US defeated and
of hating his country. Most of the accusers/fellow travellers (so to
speak) never served their country, as Novak did, and the attack on his
patriotism is a bizarre kind of Kafka-Stalin mix.

Overall, from this fine book--you'll find that Robert Novak is like your
favorite uncle. He at times drinks too much, smokes too much, gets into
fistfights, swears, and pontificates. But in spite of all that--maybe
because of all that--you love the cantankerous old fart!

74 of 83 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Dark Side's Take, July 15, 2007

By 

Christian Schlect (Yakima, Washington/USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington (Hardcover)

A very good book for national political junkies, fans of cable TV news/opinion programing, and those interested in the extended column-writing career of Robert Novak. (The reverse side of this coin is that those who did not watch The Capital Gang and Cross Fire will not have much interest in the ins and outs of these CNN programs.)

Old scores are settled, past dust-ups are explained (notably the author's role in the Valerie Palme/CIA story), and personal views by Mr. Novak on decades of both national political leaders -- and those who reported on them -- are set forth with hard-edged clarity.

This is a much better book than many recent Washington, D.C. memoirs (such as the late Jack Valenti's, also published this year.) Mr. Novak writes with the honest abandon that comes from not caring too much what others in his nominal circle might think.

I appreciated most in this book the author's personal evaluations and insights devoted to past political figures and administrations, such as that of President Johnson.

43 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable, Fascinating Book, July 21, 2007

By 

Thriller Lover (Las Vegas, Nevada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington (Hardcover)

Whatever you think of Robert Novak's political views, it's hard to deny that he's played a large role in American political life since the late 1950s. It's hard to think of too many reporters that covered the Eisenhower years who are still active today.

PRINCE OF DARKNESS is a remarkably enjoyable book about Novak's life as a reporter, which provides a lot of insights into American history. Novak is undeniably ideological, but that's half the fun of reading this memoir. I grew up watching Novak on CNN, and I always found him enjoyable to listen to, even if I sometimes violently disagreed with his mostly conservative opinions.

This book is pretty much what you think it is. It is filled with a lot of anecdotes, fun stories, and a ton of Novak's blunt opinions and evaluations of people. It also provides some insights into the nature of political journalism and how its evolved over the last fifty years. If you're a political junkie and enjoy watching Novak on television, you should really enjoy this book. But if you can't stand the sight of him, as some people clearly do, then this book is obviously not for you.

Apparently the original manuscript of this book was 1,400 (!) pages long and Novak's editors forced him to cut it down quite a bit. There is still a lot of minutiae in this 672-page book, some of which will go over the heads of people who are not obsessed with politics. But overall, this book is very enjoyable and I recommend it to conservatives and liberals alike who are interested in political history.