Documents and revelations

Henry Kissinger in The White House Years:

Historians rarely do justice to the psychological stress on a policy maker. What they have available are documents written for a variety of purposes-- under contemporary rules of disclosure, increasingly to dress up the record-- and not always relevant to the moment of decision. What no document can reveal is the accumulated impact of accident, intangibles, fears, and hesitation.

Robin Weeks, Cloak and Gown:

On any important subject, there is no single document or even group of documents that contain "the secret." No spy could know enough to spot such a document if it existed, and no vacuum cleaner approach to espionage, even should it gather up two or three documents of the highest importance, would lead without all the analytical skills of the humanists to any valid conclusions. Documents do not speak: they do not declare that they are "the offbeat thoughts and recommendations of a highly-placed but erratic advisor," not a draft intended only for discussion, not a record of a decision rescinded orally the next day.

Edward Jay Epstein, Between Fact and Fiction: The Problem of Journalism:

Indeed, given the voluntary nature of the relationship between a reporter and his source, a continued flow of information can only be assured if the journalist's stories promise to serve the interests of the witness.