Doug Levitt’s Story About The Greyhound Diaries

The Greyhound Diaries is a project that lasted over a decade. It involved Doug Levitt, an American singer/songwriter, travelling over 70,000 miles in Greyhound buses. The Greyhound Diaries are songs, stories and images of fellow travelers, which resulted from his experience of crisscrossing the country. During an interview with DCist, Doug Levitt talked about The Greyhound Diaries and explained why he ventured in travelling around nation. His decision to travel the country on Greyhound buses was inspired by the poverty crisis in the U.S., which needed to write songs and tell stories about.

He decided to travel on bus in order to interact with people who use buses in a country where basically people do not board the bus unless they have to, thus a group of people struggling to get by. However, the artist explained that the trips actually helped him understand his father’s suicide through sharing stories with others, which helped him heal. Growing up in D.C. and going to public schools exposed him to different kinds of people from different societies and politics, which he said instilled a civic mindset and an outward focus into him.

Moving further from D.C. made Doug realize a narrative gap in the news coverage and conversation where there is an assumption that news and discussions are inclusive yet there are numerous people in small cities that are not involved. Doug Levitt asserts that it was easy to get people to tell their stories since he was broke during that period, thus he easily fitted in. Lastly, the experience taught him that the American landscape has diverse population, which is connected by people’s stories. His shows promote the idea of telling stories to help people connect.

About Doug Levitt

Doug Levitt is a former London-based foreign correspondent. He once reported for ABC, CNN, and MSNBC among others. CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, Reuters, Billboard and The Wall Street Journal have featured Doug in their shows. He is an alumnus of Cornell University and the London School of Economics where he earned his Master’s in International Relations. Doug started his career as a foreign correspondent then switched to being a singer-songwriter. He started working with the producer of Americana, David Henry. He still works as the producer of Greyhound Diaries.