Michael Lewis: Find value, and you find a story

Sam Strimling of The Daily Californian interviewed financial journalist Michael Lewis, the author of “Liar’s Poker” and “The Big Short.”

Here is an excerpt:

DC: Do you feel like writing about finance changed the way you write about other subjects?

ML: In both “The Blind Side” and “Moneyball,” value is at the center of the narrative. I think studying economics and not writing about finance but actually being in the markets, certainly had an effect. It changes the question. At the center of the “The Blind Side” is the question, “Why did this kid’s value change so much?” At the center of “Moneyball” is the question of why baseball as a sport fails in valuing talent. Those are the sort of questions that traders ask about securities.

DC: How do you feel like writing nonfiction has influenced you stylistically?

ML: If you get your start in journalism, you are going to have to have some facility with getting basic information across clearly. Fiction writers pride themselves on being essentially unknowable. Any fiction writer worth his salt thinks that, on some level, you are never going to understand his book because it goes so much deeper than you know.

Read more here.