David Sedaris' family of characters | The News Journal | delawareonline.com

David Sedaris' family of characters | The News Journal | delawareonline.com:

News Journal: NPR's "This American Life," a radio program to which you have contributed, recently retracted Mike Daisey's controversial report on Apple factory workers in China after it determined that some of the information was fabricated. Do you think nonfiction writers have a license to embellish?

Sedaris: There was only one time in my life when I wrote something for "Esquire" as a journalist. I went to a morgue in Phoenix and spent 10 days there. I don't want to be a journalist. It does not interest me. What are you going to do if comedian Chris Rock gets up on stage and says his father beat him until he was black and blue? Are you going to fact-check that? I don't think humor writers should be journalists. I embellish as much as I can get away with.