PeTeR ZuCKeRmAN
Continues from Pg. 23
PZ: ya, I would say I’m a risk taker to some ex-
tent. Certainly this project was a hugely risky
project for my career. And I went places that…if
I’d gotten hurt people would say “Well, that was
not wise of him to go there.” One thing I’ve seen
is that the line between courageous and crazy
can be very…it can be hard to tell the difference
between the two. One can be, you are successful,
and the other can be, you failed. Sometimes do-
ing something that is scary is what you need to
do and I feel like a lot of being a good journalist
is having guts.
JK: The book took two years to research. How
many times did you think to yourself "What the
hell have I done?"
PZ: I thought that a lot.
JK: I got a kick out of the scene where the West-
ern Asian climbers were watching Brokeback
Mountain. It was one of the few relatively light
hearted moments in the book. How was that the
movie?
PZ: I have no idea honestly. you think you are in
Pakistan where being gay is criminal. And you
are on a mountain camp so there aren’t really
any rules. There was a gay climber but he did not
want me to tell people that he’s gay. He might
have brought the movie? All of these conser-
vative Muslims who come from a background
where they think that homosexuality is ter-
rible… a lot of them were like “ya, I really liked
that actually.”
JK: Do you think as an author you’ll top this?
Will you ever have a bigger story than this?
PZ: Oh, I hope to. I feel like you always want
the next project to be bigger and more difficult
than your previous project. And I’m thinking of
a second book, maybe involving the Mars Rover
Curiosity. That’s one of many. I’ve thought about
doing something about Scientology. I like to
think this is just the beginning.
JK: As a gay man, I couldn’t help but feel proud
of you for doing this kind of book. It felt very
brave to me. Even though you weren’t in the sto-
ry, as I read the book I kept imaging you chasing
the story. Do you feel proud of yourself?
PZ: I’m really happy with how it turned out. I
feel really fortunate to have worked with incred-
ible people who put their lives on hold to talk to
me, who are some of the best athletes in the word
that nobody’s ever talked to in as much detail
and who allowed me to see the world through
their eyes. Without their help this would have
been impossible. In some ways this is really
Continues on Pg. 59
September 2012
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