ABSTRACT
To write a piece such as Reed’s ‘Do you sleep in the nude?’ or Goldsmith’s ‘La Dolce Viva’ the reporters had to spend enough time with their subjects (Ava Gardner and Viva, star of Warhol’s Factory) to be able to see them interact with several other people as well as the writer. Gardner is given time to talk and her monologue outpourings, while no doubt carefully edited by Reed, provide a wealth of verbal raw material on which the reader can reflect. The biographical information is included with deftness. The point about time is important. If a reporter is allowed several hours, or a number of meetings over a period of days (as Goldsmith must have been for her Viva piece) or even weeks then the material is potentially much richer.
