Even though television has pre-empted much of the visual reportage that was once photojournalism's particular domain, the great photographer still has an unassailable place. He records the exact moment—seized out of the passing flux of the event—that fixes an image or an emotion for all time. Television's eye is quick, but flickering. The photojournalist is a permanent witness.
At 55, David Douglas Duncan is one of the greatest photojournalists alive, the Hemingway of a profession that, in its strenuousness and immediacy, cannot have Prousts. "Have camera, will travel" is its motto and its...