life, activism and the beginnings of the black lies matter movement. .. mitchell whiteheads 2016 novel the underground railroad was awarded the pulitzer prize. his other books include the intuition us and a sag harbor. this is part of our 2,018th special fiction addition of in depth.cl

feedback welcome to book tv in-depth program this is our special year of fiction on in-depth. you will see authors who writes about the cia and such. we are pleased to have colson whitehead as our guest.ci mr. whitehead what is the appropriate response when your books are praised by oprah, president obama and the national book award. in a way that's unexpected and startling and wonderful. i just think my lucky stars.

and they tried to enjoy it despite my best efforts. why does that put you in a better mood. i had been writing for 20 something years and it sort of disappears. the bonus of other peoplee as well. of l of theater repair people how to sell a book like that. my agentnd it to either it's too big of a concept or you don't.

you are along for the ride or the description or not. my second attempt as it at a novel. in the agent the agent dumped me. they make fun of me. eventually after a year and a half of writing that i finally got it downen what sounded like an interesting book in my new agents were there. list topics i can of circled around.

pop culture, race in america. some of those themes are in some books. my poker book. it doesn't have much to say about technology but there is areas thativeno attend a circle around. definitely sag harbor. it does take off from my childhood. just because i'm not in there and some kind of coded so i

think from the first page to the beginning of the end start to finish. and then some books are funny some are a little more tragic i hope that the experience is worth your time.ri and sometimes a commentary are you benji with a bag --dash bad haircut. not that cool or compelling.

basic characters on my friends. i am definitely in there. the demands of the story supersede any kind of memoir is sick urge. what actually happened to me. what is the process to get to elevator inspectors or zombies why do it again. the press got foolish. i think that is mary -- may be plot heavy.

it's a way to bury it up and not do the same thing. the first person narrator and not so funny. as the weight to keep it varied it for me. the last couple books i'm on a perverse streak to zone one a tale to noble in so the idea to stay with you. you could consider it. if you don't want to do it.

there seems to be a common theme in a and a lot of your books about a guy who really didn't get the rules of life has a certain unease around other people. the is a little biographical. i don't want to tip my hand too early. i think there's something about an outsider whether you are missing misanthropic like i am we are all outsiders in different ways. you are in the action but also as seen seen in a part is someone who observes and is part of the seed but also been removed. it's a good vehicle for telling a story.

my outsider characters in addition for the reader in the story. it was a definitely a big scorpion. and science fiction. in the loved the zombie owner from going back decades. they didn't start writing fiction until the 20s. d the obsession with zombies does go back to my childhood and parents who loved were movies.

it stayed with me. if you refresh your memory. as a story about the eve of the zombie apocalypse and people are trying to hide. a black man being pursued by white people who want to devalue them and eat him. growing up as a or and science fiction fan five books and i thought it was ready to salute the influences. i get the impression that there is an obsession with horror movies. i want to get all genji.

my brother and i came of age during the bc art boom. we would go to an electronic store in new york. we would go through them and return them and start over again the next week.k i was science fiction horror that made me want to write a lot of marble comics when i was growing up. my parents would by stephen king novels. so fantasy and horror has always seemed to be a storytelling tool. a few other different ideas about what zombies mean. my own interpretation. on the genre of this funan and important time to me.

i think different generations interpret core genres to their own needs. vampires mean something in 19th century england and they mean something different to the twilight generation for me they've always been an expressions of social anxiety and fear of other people go to bed and then you wake up in the world has changed. your loved ones or your neighbors or your teachers or coworkers have a sony zombies out to get you. and now they're out to get you. and of course it speaks very poorly of my psychology that i interpret zombies that way. this always stayed with me. when i already felt ready to tackle it have these and

various ideas in the back of my head is social anxiety a common trait among novelists? >> i don't know. i'm not sure. i think worrying about your work and if you're doing a good job is maybe a good skill for being a novelist. it helps you not coast anxiety versus worry. i think a healthy amount of worry helps you make sure that puts everything into that paragraph. making sure what's coming out right even if you've done it

with eight books under your belt. you were quoted as saying to be a good novelist or for you is to fully inhabit one's delusions to give into every kooky aspect of one's freakish nest. i think what i write about my different books is that we are sort of allow me to express different ideas about the world in myself. different theories and i think writing is becoming a way of me to interpret the world to myself. the figure out how i feel about things.

following my own inclinations. and it's because it sounds like a bad idea. can you make it work. and can you sell it to the reader at the same time you're selling it to yourself. the delusion that you have something to say. i think it is useful for being an artist. were you on an elevator. did you see an inspector. i was in the aforementioned book that everybody hated. he was an opportunity critic at the time. in pop culture.. i figured i will write a novel about that.

about gary coleman ask child star. it seemed like a great idea to me. in the novel he's on the sitcom. i moving in. he was always getting adopted by rich white people. so it seemed like a soft realism. everyone hated it. i think i became a writer then like i would get a real job i was going to write the book and maybe people will like it maybe they won't. i will learn how to write by the end. i roll a lot of detective novels. and studied the suspense.de i was watching 2020 as i often do's -- do in those days in my

20s. m there is a piece on the hidden dangers of escalators. apparently if you don't repair escalators they can detach from the sides you can lose a toe. and so so that's a random job. suddenly we have seen that elevator inspector and there. i went to the library to see what kind of skills and

elevator inspector would bring to a criminal case and of course the animal -- the answer was none. it solves a mystery of the elevator.no that became inspecting elevators. versus the intuition nest that are progressive. elevator inspector school in philosophies. i was trying to teach myself how to write i have not have a female protagonist before. and i have a book that have a plot and any kind of linear momentum. and then i took thisot weird idea. solving a criminal case and

following it through to the execution. that's how that happened. prior to starting this interview be looked at your books here on the table and said sorry for the clunkers that you have to read this. what you consider to be ahee te clunker. if you do something for a long time they get better at it. certain books i will think about and wonder why do i use so many adjectives. maybe that book could lose a page or two here or there. hopefully we will become a better writer not have learn how to do things in a more efficient way. and hopefully you get better and better. hopefully i i'm still in the getting better phase. in taking that to the next one.

i thought for a while maybe i will strip mine. the energy would take to my now very high standards. they can sell it. thirty years from now. and make some quick cash. cora is another. what is the reason to write from a woman's point of view. i think women exist. and if they're gonna tell different stories you should pick different points of view.

it seemed sort of wise to mix it up. that was in my first novel. i chose the third person narrator so i couldn't rely upon the first-person narrator tricks. in my doing it i could be a better writer. and then with cora had a few male narrators in the row. there is a slave narrative that calls instance and she writes about when the slave girl becomes a slave womanen she enters into a much more

terrible form of slavery. you are supposed to pull out babies because more babies means more slaves. sometimes i'm just trying to mix it up. sometimes i'm trying to learn something.sl and keep the challenges going. this book was hard to write because i was broke. throughout the different challenges. and then when you look back and think how it was pretty terrible there was a special time in my life. i think with a noble hustle it was a freudian slip but it is

a humor book taking off for a trip i took to thehe world series of poker i just tried to cram as many jokes as ima could in there. as a journalistic framework. but i would really was just l trying to cram as many weird jokes and bits of myself into it. it was really fun. it started from a journalistic assignment. they called me up to see if i wanted to write about the world series of pokerad than i said and set up a new for the article we paid your entrance fee. i will do that. i don't actually know how to

play tournament poker. so i drop my daughter off at school.pl and the other parents would say what are you up to. and come back at night. then i get to the world series. for the first time i have to get out of my comfort zone. so get out of my comfort zone. and learn how to play poker's so i wouldn't embarrass myself and my family in new york at the world series of poker. and then when i was writing it when you read a novel you write a joke. you make yourself laugh. you feel can a stupid laughing at your own jokes for a while.fe but writing and a serial way like to consider back in the day.

we get the immediate response. and we gave it energy to keep going. it was a specialth sort of writing experience in terms of the material i in terms of how it came to be. six months very fondly. we will paraphrase the first line of that book. i got to wear sunglasses inside. people take for that mask of a good poker player. it wasn't for once an asset in a social situation.

i will help you here in the therapy section. you do write about having a mask on. you are semi- depressed when you are writing and you are a different person when you're done with thepe book. porton to you right now. and partially i think it's good to have a joking relationship whether it is art not taking myself too seriously. i think it's important. i think in terms of sharing how you feel about i feeli about my work with other people. it's important. they are just crawling along

the payment. a lot of times writing is unpleasant it's incredibly great when you figure out a new question or problem.m. not taking it to seriously to the character of the depressive shut in i think is fun to play. and that's partially true. it is also sort of default settingfa in the public relations what was the easiest book to write. they're all pretty hard i have to say.

i will go with the shorter ones. the book i'm working on now is pretty short. g short is not easy. it tends to not prolong the agony.nd when you win the pulitzer national book award praise by president obama. that put a lot of pressure on the next book. i don't want to coast.. fortunately when i get good news i can feel really good. the terrible job. and so it's always hard.

whether things are going well or not going well. good afternoon. we are doing a special fiction addition. with the best-selling fiction authors. i want to give you a full list. the intuition is that came out in 1998. john henry days. apex hides the hurt.

the noble hustle which we've talked aboutut a little bit. and of course his most recent we want to have your participation this afternoon in our conversation. here is how you can participate. for those of you in the mountain and pacific time zones now we have several social media sites that you can also contact. we have with facebook, twitter instagram. at book tv is the handle it you you need to remember for those three. you can also e-mail us as well.

the caesar approach core. she said no. i always do the outline before i start working. i have that look with this book.at it came very quickly. and organizing the book.ck and survive the whole book --dash -- horrible vetting process. it's genius.

and i don't know why i did it that way. in this case the first aligned was adorable. and in that one sentence and stayed with me. in depth the negro became a human being. only thenthma was he the white man's equal. i dr. that loves the medical school. the main storyline takes place in the 1850s. that was my cut off for technology. and certain slang. and then there are certain side stories in the book.

in that section dr. stevens meets later in life as a young medical student in the 19th century new cadavers. you did them up. there is a healthy trade. they buy these illicit bodies and people will go and compete to find fresh cadavers they would be each other up but they came into a came into it in the same way and so dr. stevens who seems very liberal is musing despite racial prejudice and despite the spurgeon's cast upon black folks in america ironically

with their use foren dissection these folks become equal. they are suddenlye located only in death to a level of equality. one of the many uplifting moments in the book. i mentioned the outline. i knew i wanted to have the opening be an overture of a slaves wife. we follow her from africa to different plantations and i

figured i would get a typical story in. it could be the way to open up the world to face that. i was writing a book even though i did have a strong structure. for the short biographical chapters. in medical school. after a certain section i would think who should get them. we meet a husband and wife team who have taken cora and what can the upbringing and bring to the book what can ethel bring to the book. the strong structure before i started.

and those short sections are very useful can you read the underground railroad as historical fiction. i think you are well versed in well-versed in historical fiction. i am moving something from the late 19th century. i have the idea to make the underground railroad. and for that very conception the fantastic element. i can do a lot of different things in the book. i have these different alternative americans. successful consumption.

i guess my motto when i was writing the book was that i would not stick to the facts but i would stick to the truth a larger american truth. is not bound by chronology and what actually happened. that i can make and give it to the reader. did the the randall plantation actually exist. did you visit these places in your research. workwear is raised. it's my own creation. in doing the research. i have the latitude to make my own sort of plantation and i think from pop culture all of us have the idea of the plantation looks really big.

the could be one of three slaves on a small family farm. on the midsizees plantation. randall is known with how plantations actually work. in terms of visiting plantations i was two thirds of the way through and i figured let's be a real writer and do some field research. i flew to new orleans with my wife. and took two plantation tours. i was the only black person on the to her bus.er and this is a river road that would take all of the goods was very calm located.

owning and running eight plantation was not just sitting there. and once you bring in the mint juleps and workers. honestly i'm not in a rigorously historically rigorous travel log. i went to two places. the whitney plantation. devoted to the slaves experience. you should go. and for fiction writer to feel about the atmosphere in my skin. the sounds of the insects. and then getting names that they would describe how various exhibits to how much slaves were sold when people

came in for me i'm just writing down names and some of those names that i got from the whitney plantation are in the book. how much people were sold for and all that sort of stuff. and go to the next plantation. it's what you probably seen in movies.. sort of the stereotypical loss. if you want to into enter vellum theme wedding. and have a slavery themed wedding. the hotel rooms. if you want to break through from hotel chains you can stay here.t' writing a book about slavery and getting people's actual stories coming across early 21st century ironies about race

and in the way that we deal with race. is nothing compared to the actual stories of slavery themselves. it was a red -- weird adventure. did the to a guide ignore you or spend too much time talking to you. i think it is really should get the same speech two times a day three times a year. a lot about what we think. we don't necessarily think about day-to-day conditions and the complete vast array of dehumanizing we don't examine our assumptions about what it

cost in costs in terms of families. a lot of us don't think about that they throw away who would would give us a complete understanding of it. it was almost a month long read for a lot of my colleagues to read the underground railroad. i will read you one from our colleague deb davenport. the other ones are they actual ads from newspapers. they are. the university of north carolina digitized they have a

great digital archive. and they invite me to speak so in a couple days i'm going down there. and hopefully i can express my gratitude is when the slave runs away what you do. you place an ad in the newspaper.e and as a fiction writer we like to hear how people talk. the eight line runaway slave line. the capture so much. in the format is usually like $50fo for our slave. who ran away and for for no reason at all. she the downcast expression. of course. a burn on an arm from an accident. how did she get that. last seen in the vicinity of

edmonton farm. and so what is that. how did she get that burden. there are silly levels of some levels of denial in the end. that decided to stick them in there. and then also they are out doing the researchh i was just struck at the other observation. you don't have to be a farmer or save -- slave master to hold up the system. you could be a journalist working in newspaper. and you are part of upholding the slave system and enterprise. you are part of the link in the chain that keeps the system going. you are a blacksmith and you make shackles. for the cards that are takingu calm to the markets.

you are making nails for the houses. in so when i was researching i end up thinking about how vast the enterprise was. there was a blacksmith in the classified ads there. so broaden the idea in the scope of the world of how vast and insidious the slave system was. >> you a line in there. everybody is working for eli whitney. the slaves of course our masters and then ridgway who is the antagonist in the book. he is as much as anyone in the bondage. everyone is popping up. everyone is caught in this insidious grit. did i miss read this.

i think they recognize the humanity. i think they wanted a well rounded compelling antagonist for my formidable cora and i think we should see ourselves there. it makes them live. he is a terrible philosophy. but in the same way when cora the ridgway in the moment of weakness. we recognize some and if you can recommend nice that quality in yourself.

when you teach a class and we have taught several universities. what are two things you want the students to leave with. we had three months so people can write three stories. i think it's something different. if you only freight stories about 18 killed girls from new jersey because you are one. if you only write fantasy. you had three months the voice and try it. why do you avoid it a bit actually works for you. about stretching yourself. that's one thing and then pick

yourself up and try something different. i think it would be fine people who are going to be architects. i have people like lori moore. and people they not necessarily read once i get out of school if there is some he likes you read everything by them. what kind of writer they want to be. was it hard for you to write your antagonist no more than

having an elevator inspector. and i know people. you're always drawing upon your own knowledge of yourself. whateverwh small collection of insights you head about humanity. if you have a big cast if you have a small cast in the book like sag harbor. you are always finding yourself in different characters and finding places where you are different and hopefully for what you know about yourself and other people making characters who are not like you recognizable on the page.

another colleague of c-span who has been reading all the books. and tweeting it out. had questions from several books. he wanted to know who was james holt. it's funny because the first time i think about itfi when they came out. we were invited to the college. so james fall obviously that is the first name i saw. james of fulton is the inventor of the tuition is to school. and the into tuition us steps into an elevator. in divine.

the elevator inspector in our community. and then james fulton is the man to come up with the philosophy. i grew up in the 80s and went to college in the 80s. that meant wars between the canon candidness in the multiculturalists. when we made the elevator inspector school. you can have the conservative into progressive war play out.er the intuition us are those withof multiculturalists the establishment. and james fulton comes up with the secret text. my book sounds good or bad. evenqu -- either the book sounds

cool at this point or it sounds totally stupid. i'm re-creating my own way of feelings. f i literally had no idea what you just said. i'm sure the audience followed you closely.fo is sag harbor a real place. on the tip of long island. for the last couple of decades. and the town of sag harbor is nestled there. with southhampton. and there is an old willing town mentioned a lot of goods went fromt that part of long island sound and starting in the 30s and 40s there was

african-american doctors, lawyers and teachers. getting summer places. they have some extra money.d it spread by word-of-mouth. people in harlem are going. in the 30s and 40s. they tell their cousin in new jersey and they start coming. i spent my summers out there. i grew up in the city but then i would grab until college. so it is based on my adventures and sag harbor the town. was there anything worse than playing keep away with your stuff that dreary rehearsal for adulthood. he is doing a lot of identity formation. i think he is figuring out

where he is part of his community where he deviates from his community. his peers he is a black kid or could you like both. whether it is to be a person and part of that. with that weird identity battle and they continue as you get older. that kind of psychological warfare you are engaged in your community and the world. you insert a wake-up to be an individual. it is sort of an upscale middle-class and you have made it. sometimes it's anxiety about making it. and also embracing the fact

that you're a little bit posh getting rid of your sag house was unforgivable. my mom has been living out there since 1990. she owns it. 's's not mine. people have been (going out there for generations. re my grandparents and their peers all had little plots of land and houses. the kids grew up in them. and then their grandkids. anyplace in the worldn a lot of families use to go out there in michigan and they were going to go out to sag harbor.

new people take over the neighborhood and the people like this piece of land. and then in the 21st century realize it was nice beachfront property. as more integrated now. and so it has changed from what it was when i was a kid. trying to sort of talk about that place. it is the moment before it becomes sort of the hamptons proper in the posh environment. my dad passed away a short time before. i'm not sure how much he would've liked it. my mom dug it and then it came out. and everybody from out there seem to embrace it.

the character in the book. and he said he somebody. i heard him in your book. i haven't read it but i've heard it's good. he does a voiceover work. that kept coming. i heard a minute but i haven't read it yet. it really bothered her. most people who are actually in the book were not bothered. again this is a fiction book. we were a made-for-tv family and when he called action we have our marks and delivered our lines. the scripts were all the same we have the formulas down.

that doesn't have much to do with my family but it does deal with pop culture and i'm sort of talking about the cosby show when they came out. a lot of middle-class black people embraced it as we are finally on tv. a brownstone in brooklyn heights. two parents and professionals in many ways the first time we saw ourselves in that particular way on tv. pop culture is very important to the main character. it's how we sort of filter the world so to the relationship to the cosby show it becomes becomes the way of talking about talking about the lie behind light behind that kind of cosby show a fictionnd in doubt we know bill cosby in

his own life has underscored the reception. whether he is talking about the cosby show or rose where your.p it becomes a way of going throughout the world. and actually if you have to exaggerate to make the story interesting. did they really whenever black people were going to be on. in the 60s they were to be on the tonight show. they would have a run-up of the listing of any black person that was in to be an tv.

it was so rare and lovely. the black press would tell you when you're to be you can be on tv. we have talked for an hour. and kicking me off. and more importantly we are getting america involved here. for to begin with a phone call from charles in albuquerque new mexico. thank you for your patience. first of all i think it's been wonderful. i enjoyed listening to the show. not only your insightful questions but colton opening up and letting us have a little bird's eye view into that magnificent brain of his. i have the blessing of being friends with him. he always talks to me about having to find the harvest time.

and you're stuck. how is this character developing do you want to craft it towards a certain way. and then colson was talking about also making sure to maintain the book forward. and also the beauty and difficulties of opening yourself up. when you do a historical novel the fact that you have to take some creative license with what you're doing so it does help in terms of the story development but still being true to what the story you're trying to convey is. my question has to do with there has been so much that they talked about. in the story element this plot and structure. the background and is there certain times when he gets bogged down and not know exactly where to go with where he wanted to take something.

sometimes you just head to write those pages down. about persevering when you have this daunting task ahead of you. and just cranking out this view pages a day. thank you for calling in. it has worked. some days you are definitely in tune with the product and everything is coming together. and some days you are just struggling to a paragraph. it's a victory. a novel is a marathon. even though that one paragraph to is a lot. my own way of keeping us sane. if i can do eight pages a ghweek. it's like 400 a year.

that's like a novel and a dorky way of thinking about it. and some days you get up read a book. maybe those pages are tuesday and wednesday. saturday and sunday.maos if i get eight pages. kind of keeps me sane and some days i wake up and i don't feel like working or not feeling it. it doesn't take the same part of the brain but you are making progress towards the end of the book. give a sense of detachment from your characters. the intuition is there is a menstrual show scene. i remember getting very angry with sag harbor.

it was a little bit more removed from my previous characters. i felt very raw writing it a lot. and then writing about slavery and the railroad. in the new book which also deals with institutional racism and more horrific aspects of america. i do get angry when i researched and concede that i'm actually writing it. it's an act of creation and not an act of grievance. so that the reader can come to the story. he is a little black boy. he is the assistant to the white slaves.

i have the idea for the book many years ago. i waited until i was ready to write it and i think i wrote the book ten years ago. but my role was a millennium do what mill and do what he wants. he is the white slave catcher. he has been set free. and then he keeps hanging out with ridgway and works with him. i was trying to eliminate the weird corners of the master slave relationship. upon being freed at the end of the civil war. the state with their masters and knew nothing else. we can't really conceive of that kind of psychology but it actually happened. there were slave masters cd may be raised by house slave.

who swear that she was part of the family. she raised me from a pop. her family, her children. and head that denial of the slave master. they make a weird duo they do eliminate for us a very odd dynamic of the slaves. good afternoon you're on with colton whitehead. thank you very much. a quick question have you considered writing drama eithernc first stage or media or cinema.

i went to harvard for undergrad. they were very conservative english department. they had one class on american fiction after 1945 i did study classes in the african-american studies department. and i think dialogue is very important in my work. in times when i had needed money i think do i want to teach a screenplay i would do that. i would leave my house to teach. i'd get three pages in. this sucks. i ended up going back to fiction but i think i grip on tv and film and those mediums

are very important to me. they come from science fiction. and so i was a tv critic for a while. i can do fiction and nonfictionwh but i don't really have the chops to leave those two genres. as underground railroad being serialized. this book has been embraced and when it came out we sent it to hollywood. and various people look at it and we got a call from a young filmmaker and had great ideas and it was barry jenkins who did moonlight. it have not come out yet. we saw an early version of it. i have to interview him and see if he was right for the job.

were there any slave movies where you find this information. i was thinking paul thomas anderson there will be blood in the master. that's the right answer. weirdly he got the oscar and then the contracts came to a week later. he was pitching folks. and then the amazon studios was get into gonna do a mini series of it. maybe about 6 miles north of princeton you were kind enough to autograph my copy of underground railroad at the schomburg center last year and i know that you and kevin eryoung was he a year ahead of you.

kevin young the poet. the nonfiction writer. we can let you go there it's hard to interact with it delay up there.ll he's have a crazy year we started writing together we knew each other as young writers in college. he was always the more professional one and i was a more slacking one. always knew what he was doing he have his first book of polish treat published. in new york city. into the author of a about which just came out a few months ago. about hoaxes in america. they already traded work.

and hopefully it's great to seeti what's go ahead. i was just asking the underground railroad. there were homes. with a social network. in the 1840s the locomotive is a transforming transforming america. it's very powerful image and metaphor. there was a slave who ran away from his master and he said to himself there is no trace of them. it's as if hee disappeared on a underground railroad.

it would help them go to the north. and you are hiding someone for a couple of weeks until the coast is clear. maybe you're taking someone handing them off to someone else.. t the risk with themselves. risking their lives to help slaves escape. there was eastern seaboard routes. you can end up in indiana massachusetts or new york.k. it was obviously not a literal chain. i did meet peoplen. who have gone for decades thinking of that. which of course is very impactful. but 2000-mile tunnel from new

york to florida is very impractical. was there a significance in the fact that the different stations somewhere decorated beautifully somewhere very utilitarian. with the white subway title. subway title. i wanted them all to be different. some are very grant some are very accommodating to the visitors coming through. bob in eastern pennsylvania e-mailed him. you have referred to your couch more than what -- more than once. i get up and take my son to school come back home and take the first nap of the day on the couch.t i read a page. another nap have a snack.

again we had one to three pages a day is ada good day. i'm the kind of person that if i have a doctors appointment at one and like the whole day is shot. i will go do something else.a en three to five days a week is typical of the working day. and then a lot of hobbies that are cooking. i figure out what to make for the family. when you cook for like a couple hours and you have a sense of completion. i think i like the sense of accomplishment that a get from making the braised short ribs. you get the satisfaction of sharing with people and not waiting 24 months. let's go back i find it.

some people go to cafés to work. i would be able to make a human sandwich take a nap.a you can't really take a nap in the café. if you leave the house. there are some people out there. they say in their own the hot. little hot. and stay focused. with that notoriety now. can you still be anonymous. from a small community.

and we've done more tv than usual and more magazine step. it's a little uncomfortable. dry food in my face. now they are just recognizing me. it's nice. i could be on some sort of a taxi cab has almost hit me or something. it's always nice that it has a nice kind word that brings you back to a nice place. you are invited to the laura bush symposium on the harlem renaissance writers. and maria was been the washington post book editor at the time ask you the question how you felt about african-american section in the book store and you kind of

didn't really give an answer. do you have a more definitive answer about that. the borders are not a business. a long-standing policy of having a a literature section. in an african-american book section. i think ideally you are in both. when i was in high schooll i would go to the black section with that bookstore. the ran a person random person that you haven't heard about. who is this guy. the place to find works about your culture. and i think it came out of a good idea in the 70s. the black studies. why would you have toni morrison in the black section. she should be in both.

i think she is in both sections. it's not as big as the weird segregation. and now it slipped its purpose. are not as much anymore. the next call comes from tina and hollywood each. thank you sir. i would just like to tell this gentleman i was raised in a suburb of philadelphia we were never taught that there was a variable with blacks. i just apologize to you that this is what youu had experience. thank you for your work. i appreciate all you've gone through. thank you. thank you tina. thanks for reading. i'm glad you grew up in a very progressive place.

by philadelphia. it has its terrible sides. and a lot of that in the terrible part of the character ends up determining so much of our history. but thank you for reading. you grew up upper-middle-class in new york city did you go through a lot. it's called its prejudice based on the color of your skin not your dad -- zip code.yo like most young black men i had i've been stopped by police. handcuffed interrogated for being on the wrong block at the wrong time. in manhattan. pulled over.

in this nice car. you never know when that kind of episode will be something lethal. what happened to ferguson created a conversation. in the future of our life we have that conversation and then wehaon stopped. and then we talk about it again. whether there is a national conversation about it. it's part of my existence ever since i broke 5 feet and became seen as a target. the talk sure. the first person to give it to merg was richard pryor. he was a bit in the early 70s about being stopped by the police it will take you in

a second. and when you go to show them the life in your registration the dashboard i am reaching into my glove compartment some our facebook page at book tv. my question did you always write such short but brilliantly descriptive sentences. yesterday i quoted you on the facebook page as an example of your skill. they proceeded in the series of blight. it have devoured the next two towns.

did you write themo did you hone it down to the court or was that your original sentence.. now is probably half of it. it's very nice of you to say.ha and definitely there is a narrator in john henry days. is more encyclopedic and has a different sort of ribbon to the sentence. it has much more, get it sentence. then the the narrator of this book. you pick the right narrative for the job. sometimes a more concise narrator. the book i'm working at now. and i feel that is from trying different kinds of voices. narrative styles. you exhaust one and move on to the next. and try to integrate what you have done before.t

like i was saying before you get better at it as you keep going. are you going to tell us anything about it. it takes place in florida. in the 1960s. maybe a funnier book and maybe a darker book anything i have done. this book is also maybe i should just mix it up let's hear from ed in keokuk iowa. can i call yous. colson i told him i was going to the next

room here. i was watching it this was pre- recorded but it said it was life. i'm 73 and i had had books in my have for years since i had been in my 20s i had people tell me my gosh, you get busy trying to make a life. and feed a family and get distracted but i wrote little stories. she passed away last year at 92. and i always said i was going to write about her. she have powerful impact on me. and the title i was can have don't you call me mom call me ob. and that was the only thing i remember calling her. a nickname he have come up with.

and i have the older ladies that took me to church in the neighborhood when you call her mother. every time i did she would say you're pulling away from me and i have fleeting thoughts that i was maybe adopted. and has some books in his head he is 73 years old. and he lives in iowa. and he lives in iowa. if you write the one>> story and you like to write another one. and then i had worked at summer workshops where it's all ages and people are and they are in their 60s and 70s. they had been carrying around. and they finally have the time to go to it.

this is my eighth book. when you had time to work. having a family and having a job where you find those hours to get your story down. it is always that is always a struggle. whether you are eight books in starting with your first story. only you know who it is. only you can tell that story.ou the sooner you start the sooner you will be done. what is the biggest mistake that first-time writers make. a lot of pothead friends i would just write the first hundred pages over and over again. you can always do that later. you get to the endrs and then you fix it. don't get caught on making the first 100 pages perfect.

keep going. don't get stuck thinking that it is right. the end will type what has been wrong with the beginning. i had two questions for mister whitehead. the first one is when you are writings who is your target audience. my second question is is there any subjectt that is off-limits that you wouldn't write about.ul audience i have my ideal audience member was a 16-year-old black kid who might read the book and think i can write. i think reading invisible man at an early age.

who is a student. maybe i can do as well. there is no a 16-year-old kid in the audience white or black. i stopped expecting who my audience is.my i'm always gaining people. less hard to describe than my other inspector group. and then i followed up with a book about zombies and lost all of this people. to getting the new reader disappointing them to move on. and so i don't think about my audience anymore. the things i don't want to write about i don't know about football. it's unlikely that i will have my football novel. i think that is a matter of distaste and not taboo. i never thought i would write a book about the world series of poker.

different things become more -- less interesting to you. i would've written a lot of my books. david, good afternoon to you. you are on the air. i was just can ask you about the african slave trade.om the autobiography of henry stanley. and he described some where the arab traders came down to east africa especiallyt and murdered a 30 to 40,000 villagers and to get 5,000 slaves. there is a buyers in the new world. that is like the drug dealers now. if there is buyers and people supply the slaves.

i would like your comment on that. >> i have a section on the african slave trade. and he opens up the book. before i get to america and american slavery and so is always written on the subject. where there is money people tend too manipulate that. .. .. ..

or strength, money makes you do terrible things. not likely to america or anywhere else. >> host: liz, go ahead with your question or comment for colson whitehead. we 15 the interpretations are all over the place. can you expand on the main character, the elevator inspector. >> guest: that book is more ambiguous than my other books which sometimes are mindbending and sometimes not. what does "the intuitionist" mean? elevator inspectors or technology in the city, when i started the book i didn't think about it, you can't have a

modern city, elijah otis, can only build 5 stories before the elevator becomes enabled, and that is one meaning of the elevator, i was writing a book, when it occurred to me, i was writing elevation, and sometimes it is about transcendence and achieving higher consciousness or higher level of being. the metaphor is open to a lot of interpretations and once i am done with the book, it is yours for you to read, interpret, ignore and whatever reading you have, have fun with

it, just thanks for picking it up. >> host: our conversation with colson whitehead continues. if you want to make a phone call, 202-748-8200. if you live in east and central time zone 202-748-8201, those in a mountain and pacific time zones. there are several ways to ask a question, twitter, facebook, instagram@booktv. email booktv at c-span.org. and continue our conversation in just a minute. we want to show you colson whitehead's acceptance speech at the national book award in november 2016 after the election. we will show you his favorite

books influences. >> the last we for months, so incredible. it was like the make a wish foundation. anyone nice to me? i only get it. and so confusing, acceptance speeches, the oscars, first i saw was 77, nanny hall, it is doubleday for 18 years. i was going to say 18 years, robert caro is like this whole

thing. well done, sir. my daughter maddie is watching on screen. 12 years old, started living the day you were born, thanks for your ongoing gifts to my life. beckett is 3. i am excited to find out. so much fun, all these ideas about things. and my book is dedicated to my wife julie. [applause] >> writing good books when you

are unhappy is better. writing better books when you are happy, thank you. [applause] >> last few months were crazy. behavior from oprah winfrey, got the word out. and i don't know. oprah is like read it. so this time last year i was finishing up the book, don't mess up 20 pages, 19 pages ago don't mess it up. don't know what is going to happen in a year. now the book is out. never thought the book would be

standing here. and outside, the blasted hellhole, wasteland of trumpland, who knows? what will happen a year from now? still promoting the book, not really, just sort of stunned. and hit something that would make me feel better and hopefully applicable to other folks. be kind to everybody, make art and fight the power, seemed like a good formula for me anyway. >> for nearly 20 years, "in depth" on booktv has featured the best-known nonfiction writers for conversations about their books. this your special project, we are featuring best-selling fiction writers for our monthly program, "in depth" fiction

addition. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

>> host: colson whitehead, in your speech, you referred to the terror that is trumpland. that was a couple weeks after the election. >> i grew up in new york. as a teenager, this weird tabloid of whom creature, strangely persisted. and then so repellent in terms of the campaign season with his racist and xena phobic speeches, rhetoric, that it was startling. having written a book about white supremacy to have a white supremacist in the white house again. >> host: you consider him a white to premises? >> guest: if you say a lot of racist things and govern in a

way that benefits people of color distantly and over time, that seems to be a white supremacist to me. if you say white supremacists marching in charlottesville, raising nazi flags and confederate flags are very nice people, that indicates a certain sympathy. >> host: isabel wilkerson, one of the books that inspired you. >> guest: it captures the story of people who moved to the north in the early part of the 20th century, that is how my family ended up in new jersey and new york, my dad's family came from florida, came out of town supposedly. his father got into a fight, so the great grandfather on the

porch with a shotgun and you hear from different families. my mother's family is from virginia, actually got to newark and i thought it was new york, got off the train and ended up in new jersey. they thought they were in new york penn station. the story of so much black america, escaping jim crow, finding opportunity and that is how i became a new yorker. >> host: your mother's family were free blacks. >> guest: my mother was descended from a biracial woman who came over 17 something, half irish, half black, came over indentured servant, worked on james madison's plantation,

married, my father's line comes from barbados which is a sugar plantation in ireland and the american south, georgia and florida. >> host: does ralph ellison's invisible man holdout? >> last time i read it was eight years ago. i taught it. a marvelous book. i'm in a concise stage, lost a few words in that sermon, but i mentioned it being a revelation for me as a teenager and i remember in the first section that opened the book was accepted in my seventh grade primer of american short

stories. i was reading fantastic literature and so much absurdity opening the scene, i felt kinship. it was important to me when i was younger. a real sort of inspiration. >> host: what do you get from this book? >> guest: an ecstatic american -- loving, cool, on twitter, retweet howell, lines from howell on an infinite loop. i will watch the news on twitter and three lines, that guy is a genius. the colossus of new york is a series of impressionistic essays.

hopefully the ecstatic american voice, walt whitman. >> host: from the underground railroad, colson whitehead writes that the divine thread connecting all human endeavors, if you can keep it, it is yours. >> guest: you can't take capitalism from human slavery. people were objects, bought and sold, had no value placed on their lives. the more they worked, the more they made money for people who own them. the story of slavery as part of capitalism. slavery makes america a global player. we have imperialism,

capitalism, manifest destiny. the book at different moments is trying to wrestle with major forces that shaped our country. >> host: next car for colson whitehead from bill in new york, you are on booktv. are you with us? i am sorry. we are going to have to lose bill. a reminder, turn down your volume when you get on the air, otherwise there is a delay and it gets confusing. let's hear from ken in spartanburg, south carolina, we are listening. >> reporter: i am enjoying the program. my question, i wanted to know

who were your favorite authors and what type of inspiration did you get from that offer and writing was going to be your lifetime duty, ability, instead of getting a real job. >> host: who is a writer that inspired you, which of mister whitehead's books have you read? >> caller: toni morrison is one of the most inspirational writers, i am reading colson whitehead's book now, the underground railroad. >> caller: i am enjoying every bit of it, this is a treat for

me. >> host: what do you do in spartanburg, south carolina? >> caller: i worked for a hospital, i am a nurse. >> thanks for reading. i hope the end of the book is not disappointing. so many different folks, you can get something from raymond carver, or ralph ellison, early influences with twilight zone and marvel comics and stephen king. i wanted to write horror, the black statement or black shining, or the black in front of it is basically what i

wanted to do, then i started reading garcia marquez and samuel beckett, people playing with the fantastic horror fiction writer or science fiction writer. my early love for genre storytelling, i see fantasy as a tool. the novelist's toolkit. >> host: what does the term magical realism mean to you? >> caller: what does it mean to me? the real and the fake presented in the same register. gabriel garcia marquez came up with one of the bigger practitioners, and listening to

his grandmother, telling stories about the village, mixed in, the sheriff sprouted wings and presented a brick face, and what was real or unreal and if you read his work, and a recognizable world and you hear something fantastic, a matter of fact emerging, i was working on this book, it was more science-fictiony, it was very different in terms of time. 100 years of solitude, instead of having the fantasy cranked up to a spinal tapian 11, file it down to magical realism one. how would that serve the story?

when cora encounters these fantastic moments, a matter of fact tone, it serves the book. >> host: what did you study at harvard? >> caller: i was an english major, take african-american studies, interested, going back in 2001, someone teaching the -- "the intuitionist," isn't it kind of different to be taught the conservative department? it is the 21st century. 21st-century books can be taught, they are officially old. i thought it was funny. >> host: in apex height, is there any connection to harvard?

>> going to harvard, i remember going there. wigglesworth family, it seemed whatever it takes to get your name in a harvard dorm, incredibly waspy, can't think of anything else. >> host: as someone who teaches regularly, what is your take on first amendment discussions being held on college campuses? >> people get upset at college students, college students are supposed to be annoying. for a lot of people, first learning about other cultures, other races, a small town to

grow up in. you are learning things for the first time, makes you engaged in learning things and it can be kind of annoying. better annoying for four years than out here with us. joan emails into you, and your sense of humor in the center. how does humor speak into your book? >> guest: a part of life. i mentioned richard pryor, george carlin, i saw when i was very young. they are making fun of the world. and in its absurdity and perspective, it is really

terrible and go back. it is sort of light, i think. in my book >> guest: the narrative voice goes from the tragic to the ecstatic to the universal. we are all moving between those extremes in our lives. i tried to capture that in that book a. i tried to accommodate a certain part of my personality, a little darker and that is part of me and everybody. >> host: is that in your outline when you put the book together? is it going to be outrageous, said here and third person? >> guest: satire is a tool. >> host: is it that specific? >> guest: something i'm not always conscious of. i know the book will be satirical, i knew -- treatment

of slavery would be so brutal and realistic, or would not serve the story. i knew going in. i am not totally aware of it. the first couple pages there is this narrator and i will tell the story. >> host: let's hear from gloria in california. >> caller: that is correct. i have two questions. is colson whitehead a family name? secondly, there were a couple of ways enslaved people communicated to each other about the underground railroad. one was through song,

spirituals. where there any other ways they communicated with each other? >> guest: the first part of the question? >> host: is colson whitehead a family name? >> guest: my first name is actually arch, my father was archibald. colson is my middle name. his father was -- or grandfather, worked in a hotel in virginia, a small town at lynchburg, bought himself out of freedom, worked in a hotel, hiring himself on weekends, that is how he got free and kept doing that and bought his

daughter out of slavery so colson goes back to that individual who got out of slavery by paying off his onerous fee. the communication among underground railroad folks, if you were caught, you would be put to death for various crimes and in a lot of complicated ways. she comes from georgia. the underground railroad did not operate that far south. would never make it to the carolinas, virginia, north carolina, type of thing. you could escape south to the caribbean, mexico, enslaved that far south and ways people communicated and if you were caught, you could be jailed,

beaten to death. >> host: marshall houston, good afternoon. >> caller: thank you both. i love the tv. and the msa program to find an agent and what if you write a different genre? how do you settle on an agent or how does an agent settle on you? thank you. >> guest: good luck with your writing. i didn't get an mfa. my friends did go to grad school for writing, half of them got in. for me my apprenticeship was working at newspaper, the village voice, that is how i learned to sit down for five hours. otherwise i wouldn't get paid. and collaborating with editors.

and first agent who dumped me. and had agents. and the agent, and the recommendation -- i asked her about a crazy book about elevators, who did you think would be open to that and she recommended nicole who represented juneau diaz. and a sensibility that overlapped with mind, you can google it. and who the agent is. in my case i ordered a two page

paragraph and two page -- it was intriguing and i tell my agent and figure out who is representing books that are like yours. >> host: underground railroad is a bit of a phenomenon, you have been talking about it, working on it, talking about it for two years, working on it for x number of years. are you getting tired? >> guest: not getting bored or tired. it is really incredible four years of writing it and coming out, somehow i could never -- the reception of people who picked it up, endorsed it, a little surprised and a lifetime

thing. i am enjoying it and appreciating it. >> host: how do you find out? >> guest: finding out is not anticlimactic but the lifestream from columbia is really fast and the pulitzer for investigative journalism goes to such and such newspaper, not really theatrical but quick, a live stream. she plugged in the ipad to the tv and said my name and started dancing, broke up the rose, met with some friends who were in town and elaborated. >> host: what were your

friends's reaction? >> i had written two books. >> host: the check arrives in the mail. .. is there a burden or expectation but to leave you alone and you have to handling it at the end of five years. the way i took it was that i had written two books, oddball promises, haven't gotten that from now will, keep doing that will give you money to support you you can keep doing that. i one anxious about it. it was pressure to live up to. it was really saying, you're doing exactly what you should be doing. just keep doing it. >> host: let hear from john in flushing, ohio. you're on with author and novelist kole ton whitehead. >> caller: can you very much.

colson, the praise you receive from the "rolling stone" and the "washington post" and "the miami herald" you deserve it. you're stepping in high cotton. i want you to give us a short overview of sag harbor. you and i come from new york, new jersey, and i'm the curator of the underrailroad here in my town so tell us what you can. >> john, was there a station in flushing, heroes. >> there is. illinois, michigan, wisconsin, right off the ohio river. what colson has said is up to date. >> host: thank you, sir. >> guest: thank you for watching, john. sag harbor. it's really important book for me because it's the moment i started with these sort of intellectual questions. was trying to explore, and that was the premise of the novel. so, say john henry, john henry

days, what if i updated this industrial age anxiety myth of john henry for the information age. what kind of stories i would generate from that? then it seemed i'd been avoiding writing from personal material that it seemed four books in, novels in, it was time to, and so that book was important to me as a writer, just access different a parts of me experiment -- my personality and my world and put that out there, and it started with a character as opposed to intellectual question, a character in a setting. bengie, sag harbor, this time in long island, and then since then, i think i've had a bigger sort of emphasis or put more work into the characters. and i think cora and then the underground railroad is a

culmination of two periods in my work. there's a really strong character grounding it, and i've been learning from sag harbor and doing one and the otherring intos, took but the last eight years, and starting abstract premise, what if i made the underground railroad into something real. so there's that sort of early strain of an abstract people and is also the character work, they come together in this book. so, sag harbor is very important to me as a writer and a person and i see its influence in this work. >> host: angelo, new york, decide -- no arc, delware. >> caller: i'm an author here in the state of delware, and i'm amazed how this gentleman writing this book. just now received it, just got miss book, the underground railroad imjust got finished reading my soul is rested, by harold rhines and it's amazing.

you're definitely the ink in your ink pen am sense of hum you're, you're doing it. by me being an author i'm learning something off of you. how do you -- the last name of yours, is that a -- how can i say it -- is that like a slave last name or like was it begun to you? my father also is from barbados and from roanoke, virginia, but his father was from barbados, and how do you keep that sense of humor? thank you. >> guest: sure. the name, whitehead, it's not from my barbados side. that name is clark, and so clark family comes to new york, ellis island in 1920s.

in talking about the book, i've talked about how important my family history, in virginia, not knowing others, and last summer, someone sent me a genealogy that they did for me, piecing together from thing is talked about. so whitehead, not sure of the origin but this person traced it back to florida, and then before that, georgia, in the mid-19th mid-19th century. so, before that i'm not sure. i i know there are lot of white people nailed whilehead with that slavemaster's name. i'm not sure. and then in terms of other work, i think your writing, you can only do it better by doing it. so you write a story that's not as successful. the next one can only be better. and then you have a relapse and then the third story is not as good and you learn from that. so, i keep a sense of humor about my work because that's my

point of view about the word. and then i just try to keep going and try to keep getting better. >> host: mariearch el paso, texas. hi, maria. >> caller: hello. >> host: we're listening. >> caller: oh, thank you. i have a question. how much should i accept nonfiction book as factual? is there a writer's bias in there or can i rely on the facts from a nonfiction book. >> host: do you have a specific book you're referring to, maria? >> caller: just in general. i like history, autobiography, i accept fiction as just a novel that they may have some historical facts in there, but

it may not be the truth. but i give you a simple example. let's say bill o'reilly book. on the pacific war. the son of something. the sun rises or something. how factual is bill o'reilly book? >> host: thank you, ma'am. >> guest: sure. strangely i don't read a lot of bill o'reilly. but i think i grew up in the '80s. that means in the age of high post modernism, and so there's no objective truth and your perspective, your political biases, your social conditioning, affects how you tell a story. writing -- if you write a history of slavery now, a

catholic interpretation is possible, feminist interpretation is possible, writing a history of hundred years ago, a lot of things enter into it. so your cultural point of view in terms of how a story is told, writing a memoir, obviously it's a subjective account of how you saw things and your mom, your cousin, may disagree. so, in terms of how much do you believe? i mean, you hope they're getting it right. the difference between fiction, what do, and nonfiction, us that it knopp fiction has to get it right and fiction can make it up. i haven't asked in terms of the underground railroad by, say, people who read nonfiction, aren't you getting in trouble by making the valley the fake in this age of fake news. don't you have a responsibility to your reader, and the answer is, no, i don't have a responsibility to the reader.

i assume that when a book says, the underground railroad: a novel. but it's a piece of fiction and shouldn't be taken as a gospel of how it actually happened. i know we lose statistic people die every year when the step into tornadoes, thinking it will take them to the wizard of oz. i refuse to go to costa rica because that's where they filmed jurrasic park because i'm afraid of dinosaurs and don't want to be eaten. most people can differentiate between fix and nonfiction. >> host: really don't going to costa rica? >> guest: i'm joking. >> host: okay. >> guest: it's nice. very humid. >> host: i just wanted to check on that. there is significance in john henry days to the fact that the

protagonist just has a letter j. for a first name? >> guest: well, i think i have been cagey about people's names, and john henry days. i was trying to take this. and find different "avatars" of john henry-necessary and it's a blues singer in the 1930s, it's jay sutter, they main character. and he's another sort of avatar of john henry-ness. and so i'll leave it at that. i'll leave it at that iwant to good back to something you said to our last caller. you do not feel a responsibility to the reader. >> guest: no, to tell a good story, yes, i don't feel a responsibility to educate them about history. i think what has been nice is

that, say, the experimented did not happen in 1950s. happened in 1930s and 40s beyond. forced sterilization didn't happen in 1850. it happened later, and people haven't heard of those episodes in our history. or if they have, that it happened under slavery and they've been moved to do more research, and that's great. i have a responsibility hopefully not bore people too much and have my books be worth their while. the responsibility to my family and friends to be a good husband, good father, and good friend. besides that, if you think advertising copy, the book sounds compelling, pick it up. if you don't think it sounds compelling, don't picks it up.

>> host: next call, betty from tennessee. >> caller: hello. >> host: we're lacenning, mam. >> caller: i just called to give him a message. i'm not even able to see well enough to read much anymore but he was talking about the way the black people, the things they used to get out. the used quilting. they quilt patterns in certain quilts and hang them on the clothes lines. that was used in the degree south. i'm a white lady, an elderly lady and not well educated but i've read a lot of history and have a lot of love in me, too i love people. and i've always read a lot of books, black and white, and i -- god gave me a lot of love in my heart. this guy is real interesting to watch. but i have not read his books but that's something he needs to

know is i have a paper here somewhere that shows the different patterns, if i could find it again, of the quilts where they'd hang them on the clothesline and maybe in 50-mile or 1 mile there would be -- 100-mile there would be another signal. they'd used that. >> guest: sure. >> host: betty, can you give us -- before we let you go, tell us a little bit about yourself and if you were raised in tennessee and what tennessee was like over the years. >> caller: i was raised in tennessee but lived in georgia for about four years in different parts, and that's when i realized that the part of tennessee i was raised in, mountains and we didn't have that prejudice, but the part of georgia -- and i met some real sweet black people. i've never forgot them, and i

couldn't believe things i seep, you know. i just couldn't believe it. let's sit on the front protection i'd say, and rock the baby. oh, no, we can't do that. that was like 56 years ago and it was a painful thing but now the quilting and i just thought since he said that the singing, he knew about the singing, but the quilting was used in the deep south. certain quilts -- >> host: thank you, ma'am. >> guest: thanks, betty, thanks for tuning in, and you're not reading much now. the audio book is actually very well done. >> host: did you do the audio yourself? >> guest: i did not. i can read things i read -- i do it lectures and readings if i practice them, and i've read the audio books for my short books but it's really exhausting and

do different characters and dramatic reading of a november, i can't do it. it's beyond my power. so professional actors do it and people who like the version that's out there of underground railroad, and then, betty, talking about tennessee versus georgia and very interesting -- since the book has come houston the conversation and different parts of the south. i remember when he book came out, people poo say it's going to be weird taking this book down to the south where slavery happened, and well, we had slaves in new york as well. so, it's not isolated to the south. and then north carolina, gets a bad rap in my book. it's the white supremacist state and an exaggeration of what happened under jim crow, the lynching time. >> host: so did south carolina and georgia. >> guest: sure. i think -- i don't want to get into the -- i'm going there this

week to greensboro. i've been there five times since the book has come out so even embraced by colleges and libraries and people come out to the event, really sort of nice, and it is a reckoning. if you grew up on a piece of property, had in the family for generations, you're a white person, in south carolina oh, do you rock con with the fact that your great-great-great, great grandfather tortured and brutalized people and that paid for the house you're still in. as a black person and then i was researching the story as a grownup, had to reckon with many way is shouldn't be here. it's in this luck that my great-great-great grandparents weren't killed at this or that plantation so the book, no

matter where you're coming from, i think it's an interesting to see who was -- people's reaction when it came out in france, and people connected the french resistance under the nazis to underground railroad workers. getting people to safety, subverting the order. so, it has been interesting to see people's -- different cultures, different countries react to different parts of it. >> host: do you enjoy the college lecture circuit? >> guest: i do. i think -- >> host: do you have anxiety? sunny talk about the book enough i don't have anxiety. if i'm doing something that is new for the first time, definitely i want to know how it's going to turn out. i'm going to start reading from my new book later this spring, and how people respond. >> host: is it finished? >> guest: i'm two-thirds of the way through. with certain books it is helpful to road test it.

people laughing at the jokes? are they falling silent at the terrible parts? and also if you get a good reaction, it's like, oh, it's not such a crazy idea. it is working and people are sort of understanding what you're trying to do. >> host: without delving too far into your character, if you didn't sign up for the college lecture circuit, would you be essentially in a tethered to your couch? >> guest: oh -- >> host: could you easily do that? >> guest: well, i work at home, and so -- but i do spend a lot of time there, and going to foreign travel, for publication and different countries, going to north carolina, going to tucson, is a way of not being such a her mitt -- hermit but being a life-long new yorker, and i love new york, and travel allows me to see a lot of place

is would not normally go. so that's a really good and positive part of the work. >> host: president obama, of course, praised underground railroad. did you get a chance to meet him while he was in office? >> guest: i did. it was very strength. i got the e-mail from his -- one of his assistants. i was like, gosh, someone is pranking me again. then i googled the guy's name and he actually was a white house worker, and so i went and he invited a bunch of novelists, barbara, -- and me, and he just said, heed been in the white house for almost eight years, it was the week before he was going to leave and she said he always wanted to chat with writers and have lunch with them, and now that he only had a couple of days left, time was running out. so, being sort of leftie writers

we were all in trump -- sort of dazed by the news that trump was coming in, and after 20 minutes hi was like, lighten up. you we did sort of lighten up, and he started talking about writing, has some great books and he got really animated talking about being a broke writer, writing his first book. i guess it was on like a an indonesian island and he was broke, writing in a hut, and lizards who would croak really roundly and he got animated thinking about the trull of the creative act and which all of us can relate to. >> host: where were you writing your first book. >> guest: i was in brooklyn. >> host: moving in or -- >> guest: i wrote some really good books in brooklyn. i really fond of the early days.

was real where broke and writing an article for "the village voice" would buy me three days of work and then i'd write another article and that was buy me a couple of days, and lived in various rooms of slanted floors, and so i was up at -- i was like totally messed up by writing this nonergonomic chair, this really terrible apartments-but that's what you do when you're that age. >> host: general -- jenny, honolulu, good afternoon to you. >> caller: so nice to be on the air with you, thank you, c-span. colson, i would like to know ifor familiar with the writing of an colino. he wrote in the '60s. his most famous work is "the cosmic comics."

each chapter is like a shot story unto itself. when i hear you laugh, i thought maybe you'd like the humor of "the so cosmic comics" and he ao wrote -- i don't know it's translated into inning, the climbing barron or -- anyway -- >> host: why is this appealing to you? >> caller: well, it's a magical realism thing. he came a little bit earlier than garcia marques but not much. they're about the same time. very light -- language is just beautiful and so intriguing, his imagination. so, is that a familiar author? >> host: thank you, ma'am. >> guest: thank you. he is great and cosmic comics and it's on a winter's night, traveler, are both great books. again, i felt a real affinity with him when i encountered his work income, from being someone who likes fantasy.

here was a so-called highbrow writer, doing there tools of story teller i adored growing up and whether that fantasy style was on magic realistic one, sort of the -- arthur c. clarke 11, you pick the right fool for the job and that lovely, whimsical, fantastic voice is inspirational, and if you are watching, the books are short and pick them up. >> host: well, according to what you sent us, coal son whitehead is currently reading a comic book. mr. miracle. >> guest: mr. miracle, yes. i had my last big comic jag when i was writing sag harbor. sometimes when you write other book you do research, like go to plantations. like sag hash gore which is 1958 and pop culture, i just recreate my mixed tapes from 1980, new

wave mixed tapes, comics. so, i'm not up on all the stuff coming out nowdays but mr. miracle was getting a lot of great reviews, and so i downloaded it and it's just a really -- it's about sort of a small corner of dc comics world, and this writer, king, is having a very sort of post modern 20th century take on the '70s. pick them up. >> host: david, tulsa, you're on booktv with colson whitehead. >> caller: thank you for taking me call to preface my comment, one of the most interesting summers i've ever spent as a teacher was in 2003 as a teaching fellow for c-span.

and as mr. writehead probably knows, it's very difficult to encourage students to read and get them to read. could he send a message to my students on the benefits of reading books as opposed to other activities. >> guest: sure. mean, i'm only a writer because i love reading a lot when i was a kit. i wasn't like the stuff i was supposed to read. it was comic books and science fiction, and wanted to write stores about zombies and robots and werewolves, made me want to write serious fiction. and so doesn't matter if it's twilight or hunger games. i you like it, read it. don't worry about what other people are going to say. if you like hunger games there

are other dystopia books. dystopian takes on the world. a lot of stuff you can read in elementary school that become a gateway to different kinds of fiction. the same way that stephen king is great and so is calsno. but occasionallile re be at the lie area and say, for our web site, can you say something nice about libraries and it's why do we read books, breath, eat? libraries and books sustain us, use them to live. >> host: are your kids readers? >> guest: yeah. i mean, the four-year-old, not so much. he likes to take a lego catalogue and look like -- looks through as if he's reading.

batman, joker set, 3,000 pieces for ages three to seven. my daughter, graphic novels for younger readers, tweens are really big now, and so that was a big part of her reading. she's 13 and now moving into more ya stuff. >> host: next call is myrtle in elizabeth, new jersey, you're on booktv. >> caller: every week on sunday. and sometimes during the week. mr. whitehead, i want to know if you're going to do any book reviews in the elizabeth newark area. >> i'm not sure where that is but my webs -- i am doing touring in the spring, and perhaps i am coming to a town near you. >> host: she is in elizabeth, new jersey. >> guest: new jersey. thought she said new york. i was there for a book festival

a year and a half ago. i'm going rutgers, newark, on tuesday, actually, which is not too far. so maybe i'll see you there. if you do come, wave. >> host: you're speaking of rutgers. >> guest: yes. >> host: do you do book sign snags i do. i was like -- and. >> what's the most common comment people mike you and what's the most offensive comment somebody has made to you. >> guest: offensive. well, i try to process that out. wake up at 3:00 a.m., that was totally messed up. it's funny because definitely in europe, there's a different acquaintance or lack of acquaintance with african-american black culture so there are basic questions about the underground railroad and how it works, which makes sense. then questions like, could a white person have written this

book? about cultural authenticity. you would never ask a white person, could a black person have written this book? can white people write outside race? and that's big question now about cultural, authenticity. and it's been framed in a way that has nothing to do with my book. it's sort of like you're exotic black person. >> host: these are questions in europe. >> interviewers, yes. >> host: do you get apologized a lot to in the south, here in the u.s.? a couple of callers apologize? people are moved to apologize for some culture, what they're great-great, great, great grandparents did or did not do. that's like a small percentage, and doesn't bug me. most common question is about

why a female narrator, which i answered. being inspired by harriet jacobs, mix it up. exploring the della mam of the female slave, and basically take the time even to question is kind of dumb, i'm really happy you came out and happy to answer and engage. >> host: because of the underground railroad and because of your books, have you become an african-american writer? >> guest: well ex-think if -- >> host: rather than -- >> guest: if your african-american and get any sort of slim recognition, people do want you to talk about "black lives matter," we have this booking-somebody will talk about it on our 4:00 slot. i'm like, have someone from "black lives matter" talk about "black lives matter," not some dumb novelist. my book spins off into different

topics bat white supremacy, what is happening in america now. writing at racism in 1850, obviously, because things have changed he, things haven't changed. contemporary political culture enters naturally into a conversation about the book. i'd rather be home working. i'm not -- it's not my job to fulfill your -- be the fourth seat on your talk show. i really am a writer. and would rather be home writing. >> host: greg, missouri, good afternoon. >> caller: good afternoon, and thank you for the fascinating interview. two quick questions. as mr. whitehead -- are you familiar with the slave writings of william faulkner especially in the long short story, the bear, and using his stream of consciousness technique, and the novel, go down moses, and the second question was, what do you think about the postmodern

novelist and that school? >> host: what do you think of them, greg? >> caller: i think -- i thought -- i think they're fascinating. robert cuber, postmodernist novel about the executions in the '50s. the novel called a public burning was -- >> guest: yeah. >> caller: william gadis -- gast forgot st. louis who just passed away at age 88 or something, and fascinating novel like, the tunnel. but interesting school of writing. >> host: thank you, sir. >> guest: sure. i mean, dish in terms of faulkner, i read light in august, and i'm blanking on the bigger ones.

in college. he has not really stayed with me. i don't think about him often as an influence. i don't have much use for him, guess in terms of my work, and i haven't read him in like 30 years. the post-modernist, and his postmodern collage was important for me. i read them in a class, and then went out and bought their books that summer, to sort of continue studying up on them. not -- i haven't read gast but gadis, i did me time with the recognitions. it's like 800 pages, and jr, i prefer jr, those sort of really distinctly american novels,

kaleidoscopic -- in terms of public burn, richmond nixon there is as a character, the rosenbergs. and that counted of way of taking real live character's putting enemy your book and have are your own spin. that was die do that. i got from cougar, from those pathos. >> host: from a profile of you in the guardian in 2017, whitehead's parents ran an executive recruitment firm and were less than delight when he announced the desire to become a writer. >> sure. i mean, my father grew up poor, was first generation college, and hoped for his children that wouldn't be broke, and i've been broke many times since i got out of college.

because of my career choice. but, so, they're hoping for a long time i would get a straight job and back lawyer. then when the intuitionist came out they realized i was in it for the long haul and have been pretty psyched since then. >> host: is this your father in sag harbor? can we read that this is your father, quote: he kept changing the channel out of habit. cnn and the nightly news were the only thing head watched to him the faces on the screen, anchors, this day's victim and all the everyday heroes were a parade of shifting masks. props of an idea like the souvenirs or friends and neighbors brought back across the atlantic, he saw the true faces beneath and called them out the didn't knee a teleprompter. knew his commentary by hart. televangelist snuck his hand into the collection box. the problem with black people is they waste time praying to god when they should be out looking

for a job. nobody ever gave me anything. didn't ask for anything. some people need to get off their asses, et cetera, it's. >> guest: sure. he had vary conservative take in terms of pulling yourself um from your boot straps. he grew up really poor, and end ode up having his own company. that is him definitely in that last part. i mean, i think, sadly, the first part of that, yelling at the tv news, sounds like me. i've become him. [laughter] i do yell at cnn, msnbc. >> host: thought about changing the channel? >> guest: exactly. i was -- i have to have six months free when i work, but i came such news journey last spring that just to avoid the news i started working on a new book and it helped. from 10:00 to 3:00 i because off

the tv news nipple. >> host: have you remained sober >> guest: exactly. is that's really happening in america? i've snuck back in. i've glade finished the book before our latest charming round of news. i know a lot of people who are writing who are drooling idiots. >> host: which round of news -- >> guest: keeping track of -- did trump really say that? is this happening? really going to open up national parks to drilling for uranium? become a -- all these crazy things. and so i knew people who are just thinking, like, good liberal tradition, is my work worthy now? i was writing a comedy and now we're living in such dark time.

and so i'm glad i finished my book before i got sucked into the news cycle. >> host: kirstin, new york city. >> caller: thank you for taking me call. so -- >> host: we're listening mam go ahead. >> caller: two questions, one is what does mr. whitehead think about the use of the n-word today, and the second one is, if there's a difference in tis mind between stereotyping and racism, between any races or ethnic backgrounds. >> host: what is your answer to those two questions, kirsten? >> caller: well, i live in washington heights harlem for the past 30 years as a white woman, and certainly hear in the n-word a lot. but god forbid if i let it slip, it would be a big wrong so my personal opinion is that all vocabulary should be available to all people. and the second one is, i think

stereotyping is a gateway toward racism or could be a mindset but there is a difference. so, if i hear somebody saying, oh, black people have a great sense of rhythm, is that racism or is that stereotyping or is that a dangerous stair stereo typingy where did you grow up? >> caller: originally i'm from germany, and i emigrated 32 years ago. to new york city. >> host: thank you, ma'am. >> caller: -- new york city, washington heights. >> host: can you, ma'am. >> guest: very good. i can't break down the deep differences between stereotyping and racism. racism depends on negative stereotypes of people with different skin. misogyny on stereotypes about

gender. xenophobia about stayowtypes about other actual tours and the distinction between the two i'm not smart enough to make. in terms of the n-word, as someone who has dealt with white-black culture for many years to have to at this point in history say who can use the n-word and who can't is exhausting. it's just really tiring. if you're a white person and want to say the n-word, why do you want to say it? why is thissen i-for you? why do you spend find wonder, why can't i use the n-word. this n-word is used in different ways. in the way the word bitch can be used by women and men in different ways in terms of context. it's exalting someone's brassy personality or misogynist way of

describing a female person's power. if you wonder if you can say it, don't. >> host: what if it slips out. >> guest: well, you're probably racist. >> host: this is an e-mail from marsha. how important were your teachers in impacting your current literary success? >> guest: i'm often asked about was there a special teacher, mentor, who took a shine to you and the answer is, no. no one ever took a shine to me for singling me out for special treatment. i think about teachers i had, i think about mr. johnson introducing me to ralph ellison. they were kind of racist but did introduce know hunters of solitude as a teacher in high school. in one took me a side and said, you're special.

but they introduce met to great books and important moments in my development as a person, as a writer, and i still think about so many things i read in elementary school, reading the lottery for the first time like all of dues and what does that teach us about 1950s america, shirley jackson story. being introduced to this novel to james joyce as a freshman in college, when i'm speaking in my voice, and then there's an explosive, dynamic talent, in ulysses. so, no teachers remember my name or know me but introduced know very important books that's still draw upon today. >> host: iris, south lion, michigan. a few minutes left in our program with author colson whitehead. >> caller: hi there. i'm calling because eye love your hairdo. it's really cool, and peter read

that quote by you father, i think he must have again to my high school because we all thought the same way. i lived in a mixed area. we all got along. we laughed together, we sat together, we didn't call each other names, and, boy, a lot of people that grade waited -- graduate with me of color, that's says, or noncolor-went on to really great things. in fact two of the officers from our graduating class were people of color. we didn't call each other names. no-called me a dirty jrue and i didn't call anybody another name. we lived together in the same nicks and got along great, and i think this new racism is really ugly and i don't like the groups that are getting together in government to fight each other. i think that's really petty. >> iris, what do you mean by the new racism? >> caller: well, you got all these subgroups in our government that they get together, groups of five or six

and call themselves one group or another and get before a microphone, fighting for a certain cause, when it should be one person, one vote. they're supposed to be speaking for their constituents, not for themselves, wearing colors to represent the differences. that's crazy. this is america. i wish they'd get back to it and start -- >> host: iris in michigan. any comment for her? >> guest: yeah. sadly, it's not new racism. it's the manifestation of a american darkness going back centuries. i think when obama was elected, people would say, we're post-racial society. i don't know a lot of black folks who would say we're na a post-racial society because that happened. think that people who did vote for obama, 49% of the

population, did end up voting for donald trump. when we were talking about hate crimes on the rise, talking about people marching with neo-nazi flags and confederate flags. unashamed to show their faces, like they're not even bothered to wear like a kkk mask. we're talking about the return of something or the reemergence of something that's always been there that hides, and will continue to be with us for a very long time, unfortunately. >> host: if you took out all the references race in sag harbor that, could by written by anyone. >> guest: it's about becoming a teenager and you're own identity. it's not a black kid figuring himself out. it's about a kind of identity formation we all go through in our teens, where do i start and

my community ends? where does it end? >> host: why did apex want to change its name? >> guest: apex is a -- about a town in the midwest, and they want to rebrand themselves so they hire a nomenclature consultant. her names a band-aid calls apex, hides the hurt. a kind of band-aid that comes in different skin tones so you can find your own skin color and not be ashamed, say, if you have dark skin, where a flesh tone band-aid, and so branding, what the -- winthrop wants to change the name of their town because of branding, the same way neo-nazis neo-nazis and white supremacists rebranding themselves as the alt

right. you want a new image, projects a new identity for yourself. starts with a name. i'm bringing those two questions together. >> host: that was pretty authorial of you. what names are considered? >> guest: it is the very -- >> host: won't give away a end. >> guest: the main character is faced with, was the essence of the town, the essence of american history, how can the new name of the town capture where winthrop is going, where it's been, does he have a duty to the truth for sell his new identity? and he comes to a -- adventures and comes with a solution that i think appeals to his world view. not necessarily going to look great on t-shirts or signs but

it's his solution to the town's problem. >> host: bryn, tennessee, you're on book tv. >> caller: hello. you got my name correct. i wanted to ask a question, i think what i've been listening to the program that you have written work that has some humor in your written works. i'd like to know, have you thought about writing something that is purely humorous, either like farce or a satire on some serious subject, like slavery or lynching or civil rights period, with jim crow possibly. >> guest: sure. i think john henry days does deal with different moments of black history. apex heights, the hurt also, and

humor is just a tool, and it's a direct tool for this job or not? the right tool for this story or not? so, my most purely comic book is the noble hustle, and i had a lot of fun writing it. the first line is: i have a good poker face because i'm half dead inside. you either find that line fun or don't. you're bored with the weird miserable humor or not but i think that kind of sums um where it's coming from in that book. >> host: aneat tacoma madison, wisconsin, -- aneat tacoma madison, washington, dc. and. >> caller: thank you for taking my call. i'm retired librarian but never quite retired. i want to know the books he loved or were important to him in middle school and high school. middle school and high school.

thank you. reading a hundred years of solitude as a high school senior was really great. i had a cool english teacher who taught a class on fabuly sm. and pilgrim's progress, that old british religious story about pilgrims and allegorical at ventures ventures ventures and that template for the underground railroad. south carolina is a self-contained allegorical venture, and so pilgrim's progress, the odyssey, that kind of structure. then that class, a hundred years of solitude and my introduction to magic railism realism.

stephen king, i remember reading carrie in the seventh grade and very interesting structure. there's a linear story of carrie in her high school in her town, and then interspersed are newspaper accounts of the carnage that carrie unleashes sovereign it's foreshadowing and also an extra -- it's a text outside of the main text that's being inserted. and i remember reading that and, oh, you can actually play whatever seventh grade phrasing. you can play in structure in that way. play with how you tale story. however i would have afraid that back then, i remember thinking about by reading stephen king's carrie. >> host: ever have any trouble naming your main character in zone one, mark spitz after the -- >> guest: mark spitz upon eight or nine or ten gold medals in

the '70s olympics for swimming. mark spitz in my book cannot swim so ironic name for mark spitz. >> host: barbara in virginia beach. hi. >> caller: hi. thank you for taking my call. such a fascinating interview. i'd like to ask colson whitehead if he admires or like this work of walling at the mosley, a writer i he join who is versatile, like limps in terms of genre, and as someone who can talk about being a black man in modern america. i thank you for taking my call. >> guest: thank you for calling in. walter mosley is great.

as i said earlier, when i was trying to find a model for a book with plots, i was trying to learn how to become a better writer, learning about structure, reading loot of detective books and read elmore leonard and walter mosley. a great couple of months of my life, studying the conventions of suspense, how to bring in politics, say, terms of james el el roy, and bring in race in terms of walter mosley and when i was finished, they send it out for blushes, endorsements on the back of the books and walter mosley gave me three sentences endorsing the book and i met him since then and always great to see him. when he book came out, people at readings would say i read your book because walter mosley was on the back and i love walter mosley. wait sweet of him to take the

time -- it was sweet of him to take the time. a good individual. >> host: walter mosley will be sitting in that chair for april during our special year of fiction authors. he'll be there in two months. time for this last call from nancy in bremen, georgia. nancy? go ahead. >> caller: good afternoon. mr. whitehead, you are real refreshing breath of fresh air. i want to ask if you know of the work of charles chestnut from 1890s. an african-american attorney in chicago wrote who wrote "the conjure woman." >> guest: i do indeed. i told you that my english department in college was very conservative so i took a lot of classes in african-american literature, and that's where i first came across slave narratives and first came across

charles chestnut, black fission writer. "the john conjure woman is great and has the great word, gooper, the black southern slang for magic so someone threw gooper dust in your skies you were bewitched and i used the word in any underground railroad. slave matters would hire conjure people, which is to make a sort of hex around their plantation that would prevent slaves from running away as binding spell, and so people would be afraid to run away because they would cross this magical line and be

gooperred, be sickened by this bad magic, and of course, i assume the magic didn't work bus below a cynical 21st century person doesn't believe in conjuring, gooperring or hoodism >> host: award winner, colson whitehead. colsonwhitehead.com is the web site. here's a list of hi his books. intuitionist, henry days, colas solve of new york, apex, heights the hurt in 2006, and sag harbor, 2009, zone one, 2011, the noble hustle, about playing poker case, couple in 2014, and finally, the pulitzer prize winner, the underground

railroad, in 2016. new book out when? >> guest: i finished this year, comes out next year, hopefully. >> host: thank you for spending three hours with our audience. >> guest: thank you for talking to me in you for tuning in, america.

>> here's a look at the upcoming book fairs and festival happening around the country:

and this weekend on "after words," "black lives matter" cofounder discusses her life, activism and the beginnings of the "black lives matter" movement. she is interviewed by author and journalist, torre, also this weekend you'll see a book party for james o'keefe, author of "american photograph -- behalf to, my fight for truth, and laura munoz talking beside u.s. immigration policy and provides profiles of several daca recipients. a handful of the programs airing this weekon on book tv on c-span2. for a complete schedule, visit book of.org. ...