should these offensive military preparations continue thus increasing the threat to the banister further action will be justified. i have directed the armed forces to prepare for any eventuality fed to us that in the interest about the cuban people and the soviet technicians at the sides, the hazard to all concerned of continuing this threat will be recognized. third, it shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from cuba against any nation in the western hemisphere as an attack by the soviet union on the united states. ..

>> thank you, and good evening to all of you. i have to say that i feel as if i know you through reading your books we met thank you. >> you have given me and many people a tremendous pleasure, i think as one critic said, your

books are like being able to get lost in a wonderful story. i appreciate what you so much. >> thank you. >> something to undertake -- something like this to undertake a century trilogy, i learned today on the "cbs news sunday morning", do you, too, are you involving journalism? >> yes, i was first involved with my hometown newspaper and i worked for the london paper and evening news. >> my car broke down and i cannot afford to get it fixed. and i went to the bank.

i needed 200 pounds. i asked the bank for a loan and they said no. a colleague on the newspaper had written this throughout. and, of course, they asked how much money did you get? and he got 200 pounds. [laughter] >> i went home that day and i was married to my first wife, mary, and i said i know know how i will get our car back. i'm going to write a thriller. and she said oh, yeah. >> but i did end it was good enough to get published and i got 200 pounds. [laughter] >> and the car got fixed? >> yes. and i thought, if i tried a little bit harder, maybe it will be better.

in fact, i wrote 10 books before i had a success. >> i think that would be very encouraging. to know that if your first 10 books don't sell, that is okay. [applause] >> but i think it says something about your determination. >> you know, i think it is a factor there. the thing is, it is an experience and it is exciting. you make of these characters and you give them names and you say she had brown eyes and a voluptuous figure, and et cetera. and then you start thinking, probably nobody is ever going to

read this. and i'd rather go to the pub tonight. when i got to that stage, i thought the heck with it, i'm going to finish the dancing now that i started it. everybody who eventually becomes an author has that streak of obstinacy. [applause] >> in this business we are discouraged from making stuff up. >> yes, almost everything. [laughter] it is set in world war ii. i was born in 1949, so i had have no memories. so i had to find out what everyday life was like during the war for people in the uk, which is where the story was that. ever since then, i have realized that that works for me to write.

it works for me to write a novel with a factual background that is a very much part of the story. it helps me to give the book a kind of texture. with a book, such as this one, which takes place in so many different places, do you go to those places to scope around? >> i prefer to visit any place that i write about. which, in the world, a lot of the action takes place in cities away from me, washington, london, berlin.

but i did visit a few places. i went to rent to pay, for example. i have a chapter on the development of the atomic bomb. santa fe was an interesting place, and everyone there was wearing tweed jackets. which is terrible because it's terribly hot. [laughter] that's a great drama for me. so i went and looked around, i went to walk around the streets. >> i wondered what the material,

when they talk about what will come if you actually gone to buffalo. >> oh, yes, of course. the other thing was 100 years ago it was a very different place. nevertheless, i went there and looked around. but i got a hold of the buffalo blue bow, which is a list of the high society people in town. >> going around is never enough but it's a very good basis. >> doesn't give you a feel for that? >> yes, yes, that's correct. >> are you able to do all of your own research like this?

>> i have to do it myself other people would know what i was using it for. and i do have help in finding stuff. i have a gentleman who finds old books and films and maps and photographs. >> i have never been able to let someone else do that for me. because the novelist is looking for specific themes. so i normally spend six months to a year doing the research and the planning of the novel before

i actually write chapter one. >> that is a lot of preparation that you have to do that. once you start writing, do you do it with sequence? deep at the scene together? >> i do it in sequence. you know, it's difficult enough to keep a whole novel in my head. if i started writing it out of sequence come i would get so confused. >> you have the advantage, since the stories are being told against the backdrop of history that already happened, you do want to make sure that history is played out? >> yes, i do. and so that is part of the

reason. as a kind of backup, when i wrote the first draft, i hired historians and had them read the first draft and look for mistakes. i paid him quite well because i want them to take it seriously. mind you, academic history is largely read about, so it's not that much money. [applause] >> but i want them to read my book carefully. they don't have all the information in their head what that means is that when i am writing the first draft, i can be a little bit free. if there is some kind of information that i can't find, i can make a guess at it.

i feel confident that if i have guessed wrong, at least one of my historians will find it out. >> there are quite a few characters. the book is over three volumes, that there could be something that you forget about. >> oh, i forget more fundamental things and how tall they are but i make a spreadsheet. that is how i deal with that problem. every time i introduce a new name character, i put in a new spreadsheet with the age and the spreadsheet to calculate the age it saves me a little bit of arithmetic.

next time i need to describe a character, i can remind myself on what she looks like. but then i can make sure that i don't use exactly the same phrase and so forth. >> you also have to remember that there might have been 20 or 30 or 40 years between now and then? >> that's right i have to calculate the agent about what differences there are. >> when you are talking about a certain person and a dialogue takes place -- do you keep the reader in mind all the time? >> yes, i think about the reader all the time. will they be interested? will they care areas and will they want to know what happens

next? >> i'm once had a conversation with a friend of mine who is a very different kind of writer. a british writer. i was talking about what to expect and she said, well, you are good writer. and i said well, i'm a good writer and you make the money and you're a great writer. [applause] >> you asked the composer about that. >> [inaudible] >> there are a lot of writers that think that way. and some writers will say, i will write what i think is good. and if anything else, i am happy about that.

but that is not my target, as it were. and some of them are my friends. so i respect that. i always wanted to entertain people. the way he slowly learned things -- i'm kind of a bit of song and dance man. i can make people laugh and that has really always been my approach to writing. >> you are asking him quite a lot. you are asking them for their

attention over quite a long period of time. >> there is something else. i am very conscious of the fabulous range of alternative entertainment that is very easy and very available to people. >> i want them to turn off the tv and stop playing computer games and to pick up a slightly old-fashioned thing called a book. they have to make the pictures. there are no pictures in my book. i am very conscious that i have to give people something that they can't get from television. i think what that is and what it can be for me is a depth of understanding the would never get. i know you are a television man yourself, so i hope you will be offended by this, but on television, we read very

quickly. do we get from a book -- we get more information and more insight than we can get from the tv show. i think that is probably what we will have to offer people -- offer them something deeper and richer. >> and radio we like to say that i'll see you on the radio. in some ways, radio can be more colorful. and more victorious than television because of the theater of the mind. i think it is in many ways, more memorable. >> you are right, it's a similar kind of thing. listening to the radio, you use your imagination.

>> some of the characters in your books are ones you didn't make up occasionally want to go back to the front of the book [inaudible] >> i think that there is anything about recognition that keeps you going through this. oh, this is that same person i have met before, and you have your five families from the five different countries. but they seem to move back and forth. i did not want to write five stories having experiences but

never meeting. i wanted them to meet and interact. so i have selected people who have moved around. for example, there are two brothers that are factory workers in st. petersburg at the beginning of the story. one goes to the united states and eventually becomes a gangster. another one becomes a part of the red army. i look for ways to move from country to country and meet and implement a dramatic story. >> you like some of your characters and dislike others? >> i mean, they are all at all.

[laughter] >> it is true. even the ones who are unkind or un- caring or foolish, you were supposed to make them shades of gray rather than black or white. i'm not sure whether that's right. i quite like that characters to be real ogres. william hanley -- there was nothing good about him at all. [laughter] >> baddest is not a good enough word for this character. and they say, why did you kill him earlier.

[laughter] >> it would've been a waste of a resource. i personally think it is great to do a character that is 100% evil. [laughter] >> the prime prime minister's and chancellors and all of those people. since you are not responsible for them, -- you're not likely to fill guilty? >> yes, that is right. and yes, there are some tremendous villains. >> okay. >> what i have our real-life characters in the story. i have to be careful because obviously you can't treat the

real-life people like you would fictional with fictional characters. i can't have them or say anything i like. he is a real person, when i write about him must be true in that way. so what i try to do is use the actual words. i try to put in his mouth things he says were in a memoir. to maintain that authenticity. i haven't seen where the conservative aristocrat meets the prime minister. there were two bolsheviks from moscow in 1920 going around great britain and preaching

communism and making fiery speeches and giving money to the newspapers. he says to the prime minister, you should send these people home. you should expel them from our country. george says the more the british people know about it, the next thing we know, he is coming to his best view, and he is quite sure that every day that they speak, they are turning more and more british workers off of the whole idea of revolutionary -- well, that and all the nazi and come it actually comes from a memo he wrote at the time. people were genuinely thing to him, you have to help and he wrote a memo explaining why.

>> instead of the written form, that is the way that i try to preserve the authenticity of a historical character, even in regards to a fiction one. >> you kept it going for a while and you are still waiting to get off the train. and it said, this was london. i thought that was a great piece of business. because you don't always get what you expect.

>> lenin had made a long journey to the station, that is where he made that speech. while he was in sweden, swedish communists bought him some new clothes. out of the goodness of their heart because he was so sparkly dress. but he arrived looking like a poor slob. which was largely entertaining. >> yes, that is a true story. >> i have to ask you this because it is a practical question. but do you ever take any time off? are there days ago by in the place he would rightly say oh, i'm not going to do that? >> no, i never do. i have good days and bad days. but on a bad day, i write something knowing that i can fix

it tomorrow. >> i was aware were feared so i would always write something to goof off, it seemed to me like the road to perdition. this probably comes from my up bringing and having the work ethic drummed into me and all that. but i don't know many writers who wait for inspiration. even friends of mine who have quite bad reputations for staying up all night. and all that kind of thing. if you say to say to them, one-time use to work in the morning, they say 9:00 o'clock. i don't think you could write a novel if you didn't follow that. >> how many hours is it right?

>> i don't want to leave too many years between the books. >> i don't want people to get who i am. so i'm working on that. and i like to start early, so i generally start at 7:00 o'clock. i get up and go to my desk with a cup of tea. and i usually write until 5:00 o'clock. and if i get behind schedule, work on sundays as well. early in the morning, in the evenings, i do relax and go to the theater and restaurants and so forth. >> you have a good life, children, stepchildren, grandchildren,.

>> you have other characters to create, don't forget that. >> yes, this is true. >> tell me what the place looks like. he's looking around saying -- [inaudible] and he is looking for some explanation of his urroundings. would you please tell me what that looks like? >> i like to be surrounded by books.

isolate the feeling of being surrounded by books. i have three homes and there is a library in each one, and that is where i work. i look at my computer, i have a little collection of drawings of authors of the world, and my centerpiece -- it is one of those things where he has the face of a feline. obviously come very quickly, and it's kind of a miracle. so that is fine. so i have pictures of people that are better writers than i

am to encourage me to try harder. >> are they looking over your shoulder. >> yes, they are looking over my shoulder and saying do that again. >> do you do a lot of rewriting? >> yes, i do. i do a first draft in the rewrite also, when i start in the morning, i always change it and i can always think of ways to improve it. sometimes, it is unlikely that this happens, but sometimes i get a whole chapter and realize i've taken the wrong approach. >> back to square one? 's yes, i think nowadays, i think -- and then i remember, is that there are about 5 million people. if i do something halfheartedly,

5 million people are, well, he wasn't up to his usual standard. he must have fallen asleep. you know, it's very important. those people that have enjoyed a book mind. they are very important to me. so even if i am tempted to skim, in the end, i always rewrite it. >> when think of the history background of what you're doing, is it just background or do you want your readers to get something out of the events that are taking place and come to their own sense of the men i have had before of what it would be like? >> yes, i do want back, although it serves me as well. i get a lot of inspiration from that. particularly at the planning stage, i will spend a day working on it. and i realize that there is a

hole in my knowledge. the next thing, i spend reading a book about what some aspect is that i'm writing. and that will fill the gaps. it will also give me ideas from the scenes, the dramatic scenes. because i am always looking for something dramatic. reading something in a newspaper, seeing something on tv, and i think that i could tell a story about that. and i think that we probably all got. >> when you are writing and your writing turns into movies or television series, when you see those things, do you feel is that oh, they didn't get it right or is it up to the director of the movie or show to do it if you are she sees that? >> you see, the screenwriter and director tell a story in pictures. it is a different scale. and so they have to change it. they don't change it is because

they think they are smarter than i am or just for the heck of it, the happier there are scenes in the book that don't make much sense when it is told in a the movie, so they have to change it. and they either do it well or they don't. good actors, on the screen, doing the things that i wrote and sang the things that i wrote, that is a big thrill. if it is badly done, it is not good. it depends entirely on their scale. you know, they never even thought of me for the oscar. [laughter] >> it was very interesting. very good for my education i was

on the screen for about 15 seconds, and it took about half a day of filming. and that is not including the time that i spent in costume and makeup. it is the effort that goes in to making movies on television, it is just terrific. i was walking around the set and i saw a weaving -- and they had just put this prop -- it didn't appear in the story, but it was a 12th century boom. now, looms changed century by century and it was a technology that developed. it was not a 10th or 11th century loom. it was a 12th century one. but somebody working on a film knew it. and they got it exactly right.

>> are you tempted be in any one of these things? >> well, i like the drama. [laughter] >> you know, it was a privilege to work with eddie vedder, one of the stars. i learned, for example, that you can't act if you're trying to remember your lines because then you say your lines with a book on your face and then what comes next? if you're actually going to act in a 152nd rule, you have to know your lines altogether. so i learned a lot. but no, i am not tempted to do any more of it. i'm going to stick to what i'm good at. >> welcome you have enough work ahead of you as it is. he recently wrote the third book in the trilogy?

>> i finished "winter of the world" at christmas or that i have been working on other ones since then and i have completed the outline. i have written about 100 pages. it is about the cold war. it opens in 1961. and there were two great events in 1961 from one of the building of the berlin wall. i have my journal german familyd they live in the central district of berlin. and then there's another site that is in east berlin. and they are stuck, of course, that was the point of the war, you couldn't get out. although people did try and many people die trying. many people also escaped. the other thing that happened in the united states was the freedom rides. the beginning of the civil rights movement.

people in washington dc, they wrote into the south where was segregated and they refuse to follow the laws. they were very brave. so i have a character, a young man who was on that bus. and his mother says system, those people are going to kill you. and he discovers that she is right, they really do want to kill him. i'm sure many people in the audience will remember that in the younger people will have heard of it anyway. tremendously dramatic. and i found out about this stuff, it's still moving. encourage the people who had studied the notion that if you are attacked, unjustly attacked, the best thing to do is to do nothing. some of these people just, you know, stood there were laid bare and took the punches and kicks.

i have found it is strictly moving to read about this stuff. and i'm hoping that i will be able to, you know, bring that to millions of people. >> in some ways, that is like the lloyd george thing. they show what it really is. >> that's exactly right. that was their theory. and it's a good theory. but what i have had the guts to do that? i don't think so. >> doing something about something strongly in history -- does it help that in writing come when you want to convey that? >> absolutely. absolutely. the main thing i think that we enjoy about literature is our emotions follow the emotions of the characters. and that is a really important thing.

our heart beats faster, our pulse races, we feel angry sometimes about what is happening in the story. sometimes i'm sitting on the edge of my seat. i do not know how people really read a book on the edge of their seat, but those emotional reactions to a story are absolutely the most important thing. if you don't have an emotional reaction, then it is easy to put it down, isn't it? even if it is well written and clever. sometimes you want to keep on reading, and that is what we all love. i think what i love is a reader, many people love as readers is getting lost in the book. so that the world of the story is actually more important for a

moment than in the real world that you live in. >> the so you think it's probably better if the reader is in solitude, to? >> yes, i suppose so. although, i started on newspapers, if you work in the newsroom, you can't say, will everyone please be quiet because i'm trying to write? >> so i kind of never really -- it has never bothered me if my kids walk in and ask me something. i don't like to take business phone calls during the day. because instead of worrying about the imaginary problems, i start wondering about real problems. ..

a. >> that is very good. that is very good. i don't do it at parties. i enjoy parties much too much to think about my book, but i do you know, that an odd moment if i'm in a taxi from one place to another with nothing particular on my mind i often do you think

about the scene. >> you can, one of the things we are going to do now is to take questions from the audience. i have tried to ask questions and i'm sure a lot of you have questions. this is being recorded so that was something i was told when i first got here to broadcasting and i have to tell you now. talk into the microphone. there are microphones on either side and if you have questions, that is the place to ask them. that is the best way, the audio will show up on the tape. we can start pretty much any time. my vision is not good enough to see if the mic's are up and ready. okay. >> hi, my name is jim kucinich. mr. follett i became a fan when nato landed on the british coast and my in my question to you is,

can you differentiate for us the style of writing that you apply to writing for newspapers as opposed to the style you apply to writing a novel? >> yes, that was a problem for me when i started writing novels because i had been writing for newspapers for some years, writing for afternoon newspapers which have even shorter articles than the news -- morning newspapers. the newspaper just warns the facts, one, two, three, four. one of the reasons my early books were not bestsellers was that they were written in that style and it took me a long time to unload the newspaper style and to develop a style that was more appropriate. it isn't -- it's more detailed and it's more flowing and i have the needle was the first book in which i managed that, which i managed to

use it in a brisk book. that was the point at which i managed to make that change and you are quite right, i do find it difficult. >> hi. richard reese. reese. my recollection goes back in the years that at least one of your books took place primarily in iran and another primarily in afghanistan and i wonder where there is anything taking place today that is in any way this applies to you? >> many things, many things surprise me and you are right, lie down with alliance is a thriller set in afghanistan in the early 80s and i do remember writing a scene in that book in which the hero of the

story has an argument with her boyfriend who is a cia agent, about whether or not they should support the mujahideen and jane, who has their right side of this argument as women often do in my stories, jane says -- her boyfriend wants to help takeover and she says, you wait and see when they take over. they will start putting people in jail. there won't be any freedom. that did become true so i wasn't surprised when things went so bad in afghanistan because i actually met some of those people, the mujahideen. for some reason some of them came to london. somebody who knew i was interested invited me to meet them and that did not improve my opinion. so yeah and the other book you

are referring to is on pins and needles which is a true story. my only nonfiction book, which was about the employee, ross perot and the employees that were put in jail and escaped and is kind of in a venture story across the country. i guess also those revolutionaries at first appear to appeared to be on the side of freedom but when they got into power, like so many revolutionaries throughout history, they were more impressive. tragically -- [inaudible] >> i was just curious as to whether, in your research you came across any change because there has been so much use over the past three years in electronic surveillance within the spy business or by

governments, which has really changed i think the political reality dramatically. whether this has come up in your research and writing about various subjects? >> no, i haven't heard much about that kind of thing and the reason is that during the years of recent incredibly quick technological development, i had been writing about the middle ages and the first world war. [laughter] so i was able to, i was able to kind of escape from having to deal with all of that sort of stuff but i am sure you are right. and the kind of intelligence that comes from technology is now very very important and i don't know if it's superior to human intelligence. i don't know if it's superior to what you get from spies that you get so much more bit from electronic surveillance that i think it's probably taking prominence, yeah or go so if i

ever do another contemporary spy story i'm going to have to get into that stuff. >> what the that you haven't written has influenced you the most and what do you like to do -- thank you for coming. >> you know the most important book in the english language is the king james bible, and i grew up in a very religious family. i am not a believer. as an adult i have never been a believer but my questions are devout christians. they read the bible every day and as a young teenager i read the bible and the language, leaving aside the religion, just for the sake of the words that it used in the king james translation, first of all, it is fabulously well-written and secondly, so many of those

phrases have entered into all of our minds, all of us, whether we have ever read the bible are not. we know those phrases and reuse them. and so, i think i am probably other -- every other writer has been influenced by the king james translation, more than any other. what i like to do when i come to manhattan, well actually it's the same as what i'd like to do in london. i like to go to restaurants with my friends. [laughter] >> hi. my name is bob. i read the eye of the needle and on pins and needles and i thought they were both superb especially the one about iran. your comment about lloyd george and communism, have you come across any similar commerce agents between franco and hitler

as to why franco did not declare war on the allies after having accepted so much aid from the nazis and if so, could you put me in a direction? >> no, have never come across such a conversation and i can't remember an account of the two men meeting although i suppose they must have. when did they meet? >> hitler i think visited franco in the middle 40s. >> okay, and i have no idea what might have been said but clearly it's a disappointment and i just think, i just think franco was smart. he won. by joining in the war he had nothing to gain and everything to lose. after all, if spain had joined the powers it would have been defeated and would not have been a fascist country, so franco

made a smart decision and it would have been better for the world that he had made the opposite decision. maybe he was just smart enough to know that. >> hi, my name is christine and it's an honor to hear you speak. i have a son, doug was, who turned off the tv and mp3 player etc. and picked up your book a number of years ago. it truly helped him and reading. i am curious as to what the genesis of going to thrillers to historical fiction and also, and of course i'm quite happy about this, that uis have a very strong woman in each of your historical fictions. [applause]

>> thank you. i was interested in theatrical architecture. i used to go look at theaters because of how beautiful they are and the atmosphere in the cathedrals but i very quickly became interested in how they were built. when you look at one of those european cathedrals, you do think, don't you, how did medieval people get those enormous domes up that high? they had no power tools, no power of any kind, no mathematics for constructing cranes, and so i became interested in how it was done. and eventually became interested in the society and produced the great cathedrals. the question on my mind, i think it strikes everybody why are they there? why did people want these

enormous buildings? i became fascinated by that i'm quite early on in my writing career when i was still struggling to make it as a writer, i had goal after writing a novel about building a cathedral. i felt very convinced there was a great popular novel to be written about doubling a cathedral so in about 1976 i wrote a few chapters and an outline and i sent them to my agent, who is sitting right here in the front, and he didn't like it at all. [laughter] and he was right. he said, you are writing a tapestry. you are writing a tapestry and what you need is a series of linked melodramas. well, the truth of the matter, he was right about that but the truth of the matter was in 1970 when i was only writing fiction

for three years, i was incapable of writing a novel about building a cathedral and i had another idea which was to write about a german spy in england who discovers the secret of the d-day invasion. so i wrote i have the needle and 10 years later i went back. i still thought there was a great popular novel to be written about the building of the cathedrals and 10 years later i went back to after 10 years as a professional full-time writer writing stories all the time. my skills were better and the novel that i he conceived so long ago and i wrote another outline and this time finished it. did i write five? i have forgotten. he must have said the first one was okay but it could be better. >> i heard you one time talking

about they rejected the book of yours because the characters had no past. and therefore would not sell in the united states. your comment about that was he was not telling you what would sell in the united states. he was telling you to write a novel. i think we have time for just a couple more questions. >> i'm a retired doctor from new york city. i am going to ask you a very personal question and i hope you don't mind but in your writings, have people come up to you and said, i have changed my life because of what you wrote? i think that most people who write or do things, whatever it is, they want to know inwardly if they have had an impact on someone's life. >> no, i can't think of an

instance in which someone has said that to me. i think sometimes the book resonates to a person strongly because of something they are going through in their personal life at the time so if they are going for tragedy and a book somehow helps him to deal with that, then they will write to me and tell me about this and say thank you for your book because it helped me through this. it's a little puzzling to me because i'm not thinking about when i'm writing the book, and i'm never quite sure how it has helped somebody. but that does occasionally happen. i can't remember everybody -- make anybody ever saying that change their lives. i would be very flattered by that, but why did you ask that question? he must have a reason for that. >> because they think most people, whether they are raising children or they are teaching,

or they are practicing law or they are are a musician or going to africa, have a feeling that what they are doing is going to change someone's life even if it's just one. and i think that writing is a wonderful way to do that. >> thank you. >> we have time for one more question. >> hi. my name is warren graham. first of all a disclaimer, and a graduate of the university of oslo. [laughter] you talked about how gingerly you had to deal with the real characters and i was very much struck and i recently reread it, your treatment of the young churchill and the man from st. petersburg and how richly you develop that character. i was wondering what your sources were. >> well, if you want to write about churchill, than then the

amount of material is enormous. i mean there is loads of stuff. one of the things, if there's any difficulty it's not finding the material but shifting -- sifting the wheat from the chaff. i think you get the most vivid sense of the character from his own writing, the kind of, the majestic prose and the clever words and the way he will switch switch -- he will start a rather ponderous sentence and evil and it with a very nifty line. it gives you his strengths and its weaknesses and his strength was his eloquence and his weakness was that he tended to think that was enough. he drove his political colleagues met that way.

when he has made a good speech he thinks he has solved the problem. so, i am glad you enjoyed the book and of course he has appeared in many of my books and he is obviously one of the most interesting real-life characters that you could possibly imagine. >> we actually have time for one more. >> what are your favorite books going back to the beginning of literature? >> well i read -- i read a lot of 19th century fiction. that is what i enjoy the most. i like stories in which the decisions made by the characters and the actions they take change the course of events. that is the traditional shape of a novel. li i do read a contemporary