Tyler Cowen has published his Conversation with Michael Moritz, with audio, video, and transcript available. The episode covers Moritz's life and career and his new book, Ausländer: One Family's Story of Escape and Exile.

Michael Moritz has written books through every phase of his life: the first history of Apple and an account of Chrysler's near-death while he was a journalist at Time, a study of Alex Ferguson's Manchester United in the middle of his 38 years at Sequoia, and now Ausländer, a family memoir, after leaving the firm. That arc — from journalist to one of the most prominent venture capitalists of the past four decades, backing companies including Google and PayPal, and back to writer — makes the conversation an unusually full-circle look at a career that never stayed in one lane. Moritz calls himself a dilettante with too many interests, but listen to him on learning to paint in his 40s, or the questions he would ask a ten-year-old boy in a German village in 1890, and you may decide that unsatisfied curiosity is not a small thing to build a life on.

Ausländer, published in 2025, reconstructs the story of his Jewish family in and around the German village of Wadern before and during the Nazi era, a history Moritz — born in Cardiff, Wales — grew up largely without knowing, which is part of what the episode probes when it asks why children don't interrogate their parents about their past.

Tyler and Michael discuss his childhood in Wales, where his love for visual arts came from, why he disappointed his Latin teacher, having Thanksgiving dinner with Philip Roth, why children don't interrogate their parents about their history, what he feels visiting Germany and why he now holds German citizenship, how a history major with no technical background talked his way into Sequoia, his unpublished Don Valentine profile, what people underrate about Steve Jobs, obsessives versus dilettantes, why capitalism was more ablaze in China than America, what funding the Booker Prize taught him about his own ignorance, how to improve San nonprofits, how an incurable cancer diagnosis changed his calendar, why Britain's stuck, what he'll learn next, and more.

Excerpt:

COWEN: Is it easy to live with an Otto Dix painting or sketch? It hangs on the wall. Many people think it's ugly. It reminds one of unpleasant things in history, right?

MORITZ: Yes, for Harriet and me it is. I think the tougher, more strenuous, grueling works of art that other people would have difficulty living with have many layers to them. You explore them, and they're difficult pictures, and they're not easy at first sight. Unlike easier pictures that may be a bit more decorative, they leave room for plenty of exploration, as the years go by. Then they're redolent, they tell stories. They're redolent of history. They're images of a different epoch. I think most of the paintings that we've been lucky enough to find over the years, they are tough paintings.

COWEN: I feel that way about Haitian art, which has many brutal scenes. For you, is Chagall too sentimental?

MORITZ: Yes.

COWEN: You don't want to put it on your wall?

MORITZ: The earlier Chagalls I've been drawn to, but neither of us have felt the urge or the need to go out in pursuit of Chagall.

COWEN: What is your own painting like?

MORITZ: Oh, exasperating.

COWEN: Neue Sachlichkeit or something else, it's like Kossoff?

MORITZ: No, I don't know if you've ever tried painting or drawing. I didn't take it up until I was in my mid 40s. I'd never picked up a crayon or outside of the obligatory, abbreviated art lessons that always seem to be held later on Thursday afternoon, with everybody waiting for the bell to ring to end school. I'd never taken up a crayon or drew, or let alone painted.

If I look back today at what I did early on, it's a lot better. Then if I look at the paintings that I try to make, my goodness, it is an extremely humbling experience, but I enjoy it. I really enjoy it. There's nothing like getting lost in making a painting, and before you know it, two hours have gone, and you have no idea where the time went.

And:

COWEN: If we think of your interest in Steve Jobs, your book on Alex Ferguson, the art you buy, that you've now written a book on the Holocaust, is there some general pattern where trying to come to terms with really difficult things, is this a recurring theme in your life? Learning how to paint, that's very hard, right?

MORITZ: I haven't really thought about it that way, but I think life is made richer by having a challenge that you're not sure whether you're up to conquering. I've always been up for that. Each of these books has really just sprung out of being curious about something. I'm not sure that there's any greater pattern than unsatisfied curiosity.

Recommended, interesting throughout. For readers new to the format, Conversations with Tyler is Cowen's long-form interview series, known for detailed preparation and guests ranging from economists to artists, and this episode is a good entry point for anyone interested in how a top-tier investor thinks outside investing. The author is also very happy to recommend Michael's new book Ausländer: One Family's Story of Escape and Exile.