Carl H. Klaus
From the mid-sixties to the mid-nineties, from Mississippi to Moscow, Adam Hochschild has been on the front lines (and behind the scenes), bringing back vividly detailed stories that he tells with the skill of a raconteur, the sincerity of a personal essayist, and the conscience of a latter-day Orwell. I heartily recommend Hochschild as a guide to finding the trapdoor in a world of ticky places. -- (Carl H. Klaus, founder, Program in Non-Fiction, University of Iowa)
Studs Terkel
This remarkable memoir in one voice, Adam Hochschild's, reflects a chorus of voices--of outsiders who sprang from the privileged inside: in the twilights of apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Union, in the tempest of Amazonian
America, and in the turmoil of literary precincts. It is a rich and rewarding adventure in the reading.
Barbara Ehrenreich
For anyone wishing to revisit the late twentieth century, Adam Hochschild is the ideal traveling companion. Wherever he takes you--to a combat zone in El Salvador, an anti-apartheid rally in South Africa, the claustrophobic apartments of
Moscow--you will find the place lit up with gentle humor and a luminous moral intelligence. In a time of much glibness and sensationalism, Hochschild is the rare journalist who qualifies as a gentleman, a scholar, and a mensch.
Orville Schell
Whether you are a general reader looking to be transported to other times and places or a student trying to unlock the mysteries of how good non-fiction is written, Finding the Trapdoor offers something rare. Hochschild is one of those unusual serious writers who can write about whatever interests him with intelligence, honesty and style. -- (Orville Schell, Dean, Graduate School of Journalism, University of California at Berkeley)