The first time I met Richard Ben Cramer, who died this week at 62, I was seeking his advice about a book I wanted to write, and so I called and invited myself down to Maryland's Eastern Shore. That's where Richard lived, about a two-hour drive from Washington, in a couple of weathered farmhouses – one for living with his companion at the time and later his wife, Joan, and one for writing. He said sure, come anytime and we would get lunch, he wasn't doing much of anything, which of course was never true.
I must have been nervous, because when I got there the following week, I realized that for the first time I could remember, I'd left home without my wallet. I was mortified. I had arrived at the great writer's house, having imposed on his time, and I couldn't even buy my own lunch, let alone his. Richard waved away my embarrassment without a word. He bought me a burger and then suggested we get ice cream, which we ate while walking the streets of Chestertown, talking about the craft of writing and the scourge of editors.
This was the secret of Richard's genius, the reason he got more out of his subjects – political and other – than his journalistic contemporaries, and there was really no secret to it at all. He liked people, approached them with genuine curiosity and gave them the benefit of the doubt and never got caught up in pettiness. People told him things because they knew he was actually listening.
Richard will be best remembered for "What It Takes," his breathtaking book about the 1988 campaign and modern politics, and with good reason. Here's an essay I wrote about it for the Book Review in 2008, on the 20th anniversary of that campaign. But if you love great profiles, it's worth reading Richard's other work, too; my favorite is his portrait of the aged, cantankerous slugger in "How Do You Like Ted Williams Now?" Your answer, after reading, may be "not so much," but to Richard, there was good and frailty in us all.
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