john bolton's new book, the room where it happened is being released on tuesday but news organizations have obtained copies and reporting on its contents. according to the wall street journal the formal national security advisor to president trump says the president ran the white house where obstruction of justice was where a way of life in the present was stunningly uninformed for the white house says none of these allegations are true and the book contains classified information which makes publishing inexcusable. the justice department has sued to stop the book from being released but it's publisher plans to make it widely available next week. watch for the author in the near future on book tv and c-span. ♪ ♪

>> we are grateful to all of you for being here and for valuing the past, present and future of thoughtful reading and writing. the story that history can teach us a lot about how to live in the present and plan for the future. and perhaps no error in our history is more instructive to us right now than 1981 contagion ravage the world shuttering schools, closing businesses, and killing hundreds of thousands. here to talk with us about what became as known as 102 years ago is the spanish flu is kathryn arnold who poured over years of eyewitness accounts from eyewitnesses in the early beginning at places like a military base in kansas to its number of prominent american writers like john steinbeck and kathryn and port-au-prince she read english at the university of cambridge and holds a further degree in psychology she's the author of several books about the history of london and she was published by simon &

schuster in 2015 she's joining us today from the uk, welcome. >> welcome thank you for being here with us. >> and telling the story of this disease you focused on first-person accounts from doctors, nurses, children all over the world. why did you choose to take such a personal view of the pandemic? >> i wanted to write a book that people could relate to. the story about spanish flu that people could read it and find characters like myself. it almost developed a movie you've got people on the titanic or whatever it's all spectrum with personality types. people, so many of these books you can relate to it's a very interesting experience whether it's their age, gender, certainly people got caught up in it close 200 men people died. it was also because the world

with the spanish flute the time they tended to be largely academic. there very much in the way of academics for academics so they looked at the strict distinction of the medical side of it. not the epidemiology or the geographical side or the economic consequences that left people involved in because of been a feature writer of the regional daily. it was important for me to it really bring it live just to tell me the living breathing suffering people just like yourselves. >> in the book's opening pages, you say it is hard to imagine a similar scenario in a school shuttered and hospitals overwhelms, cities coping with hundreds of dead

and dying today. do you still feel that way? are we seeing history repeat itself in front of her eyes? >> i was writing it i had no idea what we have been longtime pandemic with various sources such they had that in the same i'll get back to that in a moment. what was curious to me when i was writing it was the date it out of beautiful spring day and straight to the suburb everything seemingly marvelous. i suppose is like this on the street in a suburban area of maybe chicago or philadelphia they were saying hey your books have arrived and suddenly out of nowhere this terrible thing strikes and people start getting sick and

dying more and more every day. well with that would be a horror story. i took comfort in what i knew which is what i'd been told based on the atlantic preparation to be made to deal with such pandemic. it is true to say that in some ways in this country they have handled it comparatively well. but i thought there is far more in the way of government control in our nation and realizing there's less than that of foresight the big is numbers coronavirus has been terrible and it has killed around 250,000 worldwide. it has killed hundreds of thousands in the states. but nothing like the scale of 1918 went 100 million people lost their lives and in

norma's inconceivable number five and 50000 people in the state died. that was more than the of the first world war. so this is a little taste is like a mini pandemic to what we went through 100 years ago. we are getting some indication of the x extensional crisis the people faced. that feeling we have not had for generations when it was horrible. we lived all of this with the knowledge sooner or later we have to die. it's quite a big shock your nearest and dearest something that's taken a lot of getting used to. think younger people the millennial registration of

really struggled with it. >> your previous work is focused on the city of london members of the royal family so about the dark side of london the treatment of mental health, capital punishment, they were sent to london is originally the dark side of london seems natural to me to it do a book on spanish flu in london. so at first i looked it up with my agent but as we discussed it, and investigate it became obvious to me about to do a book about spanish flu but then we realized it was a global thing the best way to approach it was to attempt to

write about it directly seven structural terms this had problems in terms of creating narratives that was one of the reasons there so many eyewitness accounts because spanish flu like all pandemics is going on and a lot of places at the same time. china into the united states. it was literally all over the place. in trying to come up with a narrative forest trying to nail it to the wall. that was quite time-consuming. was also a personal connection because my father was a great gym more than my mother he had lost both of his parents who spanish flu in the last year of world war i. i wasn't interested in this terrible thing that happened in my family. there is no family et al. on his side, nothing.

and the fact that he would not talk about it made it even more intriguing. can of hung over my childhood like a dark hole. sue became something significant to me to it write about it was kind of a score to settle almost. what was your research process like? particularly in the u.s.? or did you find reliable information and how did you go about getting access to it? >> some of it was already there. some of it, pbs made a brilliant series about 20 years ago where they interviewed the last surviving people who had spanish flu or live through it. obviously those people have passed on by now but that was useful. i looked at their memoirs unsafe anyone notable head lift the. so i did that. and then also looked into the

newspaper records because obviously there are some great newspaper sources. i've had the patience to go through them you can find useful material. also if i looked at people have written for instance about the spanish flu in alaska. the investigations into trying to find the infected tissue the infected dna of people who died with the spanish flu. and so those investigations took place as well. so a number of those sources in the uk, and the war museum which proved useful. two you mentioned that more people died from this flu than world war i. but world war i was an

important vector and moving the disease all over the world. tell us a little bit more about the troop movement and how that influence the way the disease spread. >> what world war i was influential partly for the way it spread the disease and partly for the way the disease was not tackled with the same vigor as it tackled the coronavirus now. while spanish flu was split globally over time world war i sped up the process because you got trip ships going from the u.s. to europe to fight and back again. on a larger scale you got troop ships and the germans coming around the world to places like cape town, bombay, taking it with them.

the only place that successfully kept it up until january of 1919 was ulster really a they had a very vigorous attitude toward corn teen which was then relaxed at the end of the world war one is in january of 1919 they lost their lives to it. if you think about the war it turned into a giant petri dish with the flu being spread around in every conceivable way when it was not spread by troops inadvertently was also spread by public transport. by the postal service when that research was trying to work out why they tip alaskans, native americans alaskans would die they

hundreds because the postal service was still getting through to them. it was virtually without them knowing spread through the mail. [inaudible] [inaudible] >> it was just that because it was such a huge fundamental event all the focus really went on winning the war rather than stopping the virus. >> the war also played a role in the news about the virus having been suppressed or downplayed. why would that have happened? and what effect did it have? >> to start off with, certainly in the uk if a newspaper dives too deeply into reports of the strange

new that was coming in the summer and killing people would've been suppressed. other ways of making it seem trivial which happened with the london times in london only said we should have got along with it. in september in the u.s., when the spanish flu is make a bold return back in the summer again the authorities were saying yes okay but it's not that bad really. specially with the carpet because the last thing we wanted was people panicking because of the people who died on that base and all around them. you had the collapse of the world particularly with states possibly certain people that

we should've told you we should wear ribbons in the war. it's kind of a way which you can understand why they were trying to control information but at the same time was to get at the truth it was frustrating because people deserve to learn what was going on. and of course i got to the point read could not deny this is happening because every paper in the united states we had huge banner headlines. >> host: the disease also had a profound effect on some prominent american writers. in your book you mentioned thomas wolf, john steinbeck, a carthy invention catharine and porter, tell us a little bit about what they went through and how it affected their writing. >> sure, what's interesting

about them there's a humorous james thurber is quite surprising of the foam phenomenon and catharine and porter's case, she's a journalist journalist in colorado and the rocky mountains news. she was a single girl who had coffee and cigarettes and spent money on clothes. she was living there when she became ill. her landlady took a look at her and threw her out. so she turned to her editor for help in better hospital bed otherwise she would've died.

hearing doctors talk about her giving up on her they thought they were setting her obituary in type. makes me shudder to think of that. she pulled through, but she had -- she was violently ill when she was recovering she tried to get out of bed and broke her arm. and then she had a distinct with the spanish flu which her hair turned white. never grew back to its natural college had a diet black for the rest of her life. but she had a lucky escape she said about this in her memoir, it really made me decide what i needed to do i needed to get on with it. so she had a good outcome she did sadly lose brother in the

flu. suffered really badly, when the flu began mary was nine years old and her folks decided they've ago back home to i think minneapolis. going to go back to the midwest anyway. that was from seattle. and her father he was always broke. on the train, they soon became sick and the conductor wanted to throw them off the train in the middle of the prairie. to mary's astonish her father pulled a gun on the conductor's first time in his life he set at like you try. but they died and her grandparents with the station when they arrive. she was brought up very, very

cold distant relative. i'm sure they're just trying to do their best. she said it change the course of her life because she'd stayed there she would've been a middle-class joint class catholic woman she would've married him and simple as it was she would often became this fine intellectual and contributed to the new york think it did cause a change course in her life. and finally, there's joan steinbeck caught the spanish flu. strict covered but is strange "after words". one of the common traits was quite often the spanish flu survivors had problems the rest of their lives with depression so it said he suffered from this. suffered from this disease he

writes a thinly described conversation of losing his brother. but the description of his gradual decline and death is heart wrenching. it's a very good peace of american gothic as well. stunning you would have thought given this with so many great writers especially another generation there would be more about the spanish flu i was struck by the way it seemed to have disappeared from the collective cultural memory. and i was wondering if you had thoughts on why that was? >> yes, i think it was because it was just so horrible.

one point i have in the book it escapes me but he becomes the editor of the new yorker in this book. he said after his mother, his sibling died the world just changed forever. something was lost that never went away. it was ghastly so grotesque. the loss was harrowing. this is something people cannot deal with. the other thing your men would often go which of the war and not come back. that was on pleasant but was made acceptable. so these people at home were buried from this monstrous disease was a whole lot more difficult to deal with. especially when you say in europe people had four years

of it in the states they would have them grown up to it and the anxiety the same way young men march off. so this was the final straw after a painful experience of war. i think that is one of the reasons people do not want to remember it. >> just a reminder for those of you who are watching, if you did have a question you can type it into the q&a box. i'm going to ask catharine a few more questions and then we are going to ask your questions. so please feel free to use that. we will contact you via text if you'd like to ask your question yourself. in reading the book i was struck by a number of parallels the one i found most interesting is when the disease took hold people started to say we need to

socially isolate there was some resistance that correct? >> correct this is quite late because in generally, 1919 we have this came in waves so it would die back in the return back. the third wave was in san francisco in 1919. it was said to be right so from now on if you wear a mask you have to wear a mask when you go out it's mandated even though illegally is not enforceable. and then they said they would arrest people who were not wearing a mask. people would comply because they thought the worst of it the last thing they wanted was

to go back to the conditions they witnessed in september and november. however, sow is good people who don't agree. in this case they call themselves the anti- mask league. composed of physicians, they had a meeting in october this maybe took place outside because it would've been safer. they had a meeting and they said to one what we should do is we should petition sent to the mayors and say we don't agree with this mask wearing, please make it compulsory. but of course a more radical ones like no this is unconstitutional it's against our rights, and not what it is to be an american. we don't want to wear these masks. this went on for several weeks.

and then at one point an improvised explosive device was sent to the public health department in san francisco. it contains something like 3 pounds of gunpowder. some shot and you can imagine what was happening if it had been detonated. mercifully it was not. but soon "after words" the mayor said alright next council meeting we are going to say no more masks it will be compulsory. but he did ask the caveat that if we need to lift the mask regulation you do realize don't you that the death toll is going to rise. and everybody said yes so. and within about ten days of getting rid of masks and compulsory, 300 people died. they died of spanish flu. so yes of course there are parallels in which you can see

in michigan weeks ago and people were calling for the government to be murdered but it was extreme the government justices. >> the coronavirus were currently dealing with had serious outbreaks in prison population. and the 1918 flu had much the same scenario. there was a doctor there who you quote in the book, doctor stanley, who had a very controversial approach, horrifying approach to the disease in some cases can you tell us how it proceeded through the prisons? >> guest: just briefly i think the most shocking aspect of this was doctor stanley used his prisoners almost -- as an experiment to see how easily

his mail prisoners would catch the virus. he literally put infected men in the recreation room in the prison when people were not infected. he was notorious and conducted the number of grotesque experiments which i cannot go into into much detail. it involved castrating various people and given their castrated genitals to other prisoners to see if this would change their fundamentals. it is not for the squeamish. it was the nature of this bc prisons like schools and barracks or military bases or places where everybody was crowded in close together. obviously the contagion could spread quickly. i think doctor stanley is

taking advantage of the experimental of this disease. and just exploiting them. >> we have quite a few questions from some folks. just a reminder to type it into the queue and a box. i want to ask you, what lessons you feel that 1918 can teach us? what do you think we can learn from? particularly from this in our current moment. >> that is a good question for think the main thing we have learned is obviously they were not able to do and world war one. the main focus was on winning the war. i think we've learned a lot in terms of the value of social distancing, mask wearing if you need to plan general hygiene.

but personally i think people have become more supportive and friendly to each other on the street they would be supportive of each other. the national level obviously in my country and yours is been the most political unrest and uncertainty wait the authorities are handling it. i think in those days of course there's very little scientific, they realized it was spread from person-to-person was contained just paper the coming to terms with the idea that the electoral microscope was not invented until 1930. because of the vaccine, that was developed about 1938. we are doing now obviously as we have scientists are working night and day to develop a

vaccine and of course they may never do so. it may be that we have to live with this horrible virus for the rest of her lifetime probably. i think we have learned as i said to make it our focus because of the global conflict. i think we've learned a lot about being more patient. i'm amazed by the amount of people i know who will comply with the rules and told stay home, wear a mask. and they do so because they realize the importance of not just looking after themselves, but the communities those are the take-home lessons. >> we have a question from sandra. sandra if you'd like to ask

your question. >> hello. yes. thank you for this, can you hear me? >> yes. >> it is my understanding that this pandemic originated in the united states. i am wondering, why is it referred the chinese. >> sure, sure, a couple of things. i'm getting a weird echo but i will go on talking. the first thing is, according

to the research i have looked at. it's a generally agreed that what we call the spanish flu originated in china was brought to the united states and europe by chinese laborers who'd been recruited to help with the war effort spread in the united states and europe and the uk. that was about the same time. it is believed that this left the species barrier. according to the spanish flu it's a bit of a misnomer. they started calling at this because it really came out in its solid form in spain in april or may of 1918. it's been doing a tour of europe but it showed up in spain, nearly killed the king of spain, but because it became so imminent it was possible to discuss this flu

and it is neutral they could say what they liked the newspapers and magazines. just discussing the flu in spain gave it the name spanish flu even though it had nothing to do with the unfortunate spanish people themselves. many in fact called at the disease of the soldier was after a show that was running in madrid at the time. this came as a bit of a biased on people named ike the wuhan hong kong flu, asian flu, unaware that would not be acceptable these days. occult coronavirus we don't call it wuhan flu. so that kind of answers your question. but the fact there is an unpleasant tendency to bring groups to crop up at this time, and many people blamed it on spain because they

talked about spain being neutral perhaps a certain degree friendly or where the wuhan flu or hong kong flu. various groups have different things for. proved in the russians called common as flu spread by communists. there is a way that people named things. >> there is a question from tosha. >> hi natosha. good thank you. >> my question is, it's really interesting to hear how some newspapers downplay the pandemic back then similar to what were seeing today. i am curious, two questions. were people generally trusting of the media during this time question like newspapers and radio question but that's my first question my other question is how do people get their public health

information especially since the science wasn't there is much as is today? the first one, as i mentioned earlier in this talk you may not have been present. these papers were in a difficult position because it they said too much about what was happening they were basically spikes they had slapped on them paired they were told they could not print certain material because it would upset national morale during the war not so much in the states having looked at a lot of newspapers seem big headlines. the fact was people were getting their information from the press. they're getting more information in the u.s. from the press then we were over here. many people were in europe.

general people trusting the press in those days was the fact that some people were devoid of these resources. we know that in seconds what happens because it is just around the world with social media. then you can go for weeks not know what was happening the next town or village. i think this is the reason it spread so quickly it is because people did not realize the enormity of what's happening. they didn't realize how contagious and deadly this thing was. over here in britain, we had instances of people in the suburbs not knowing people were dying in the hundreds in london. while there is another part of your question. >> how did the public get their health information? or their public health

campaigns by government customer so yes there were. in the united states the surgeon general was the top man. by september he would feel the horror of the spanish flu he was seeing the impact that was happening all over the united states. and he came up with a whole lot of instructions which were circulated by public information. including what people would expect including wearing masks. when you surgeon general he had no authority to impose these things. so he could only recommend. what many states did was to print handbills advising people what to do. and many places took the opportunity to close places of public entertainment in schools and churches because they knew this was one way of controlling the spread.

another information is advertising. the business is making money. their information was still of great used to the general public quick look at any paper would tell you that yes this might help and above all, plenty of us with important -- one of the legacies among previous generations is a life long obsession of cleanliness. i look at my grandparents generation i'm sure that as part of the legacy which is the impact of the spanish flu i hope that helps if that's useful for you. >> yes thank you.

>> yes we've a question from tessa that i'm going to read in america was there no way to alert neighbors to the fact that people were in quarantine? was there a way -- was there a sign posted on the door how did they get the word out? how did they get the word out the people should not come in. >> there was a letter it was a method of last resort. this was the fact that people lock themselves away as we do now and very arbitrary footing because you want to know whether you were ill or even got the flu yourself. the way you knew is that there's flu on the street is if you saw a black crêpe tied to someone's door lock and you realize there'd been a death in the family. and if it wasn't usual, if they were quite young or fit you could pretty much gather

it was the spanish flu. if it was a child though put out aye ribbon. very soon these begin to proliferate, so you've got a little girl growing up in philadelphia with challenged immunity. she said that one moment everyone was in the streets having parties the next thing she knows she looks out the window they are all of these black ribbons hanging on the door. there are still hearses and coffins, it's really only when things got bad that you would know there is any kind of signal you can leave out and remember it traveled fast. it traveled so fast with the impact so half the street could go and a matter of days. >> we have a question from

judy who also once us to read it. for the 1918 flu, were there significant racial and economic disparities as to who caught it and who died from it? >> guest: yes sadly just as we are finding that today with the coronavirus, the communities suffered worse for the deprived communities other they were high-profile examples of upper-class people who died generally he would die partly it was social reasons so if you have your immigrants say to chicago and philadelphia living in the ghettos i hate that word but it's the word that's used. cramped up poverty-stricken conditions in substandard housing they would try to be to be his hygiene as possible

but there was impossible did seem the jewish communities the polish communities the american communities they seem to suffer unduly. i think most of this is economics. over in south africa, it was the native africans who died at much higher rate than the white settlers. and in new zealand, they had a much higher numbers than again the white settlers. speculated to this we talked about this earlier we talked about the postal service spreading the disease among native americans in alaska. we had a question from bill asking about conditions on native american reservations in the u.s. or first nation

reservations in canada. >> yes. the two things came out of this. the canadian example, the people who were looked at who researched there, as communities they hated the idea of isolation. so it's a two-pronged thing. first of all and did not have the immune system to cope with the spanish flu. nobody does but they were particularly vulnerable. so in alaska, they tried to tell people is alaska natives. he said don't go out stay-at-home.

it was worsening debit live together as a community act together so many people were told to stay in their cabin, just died. we know people who chose to self isolate, excuse misery drying here. it seemed to me that this was an extreme example. this is a community we were only really live if you were with your peers. you are single you were on your own and as good as dead. >> we had a question about the thomas wolfe book that was mentioned. that was look homeward angel, correct? >> yes. good i wanted to make sure we asked that. and we have a question from jonathan, you indicated that

if no vaccine is developed he may have to deal with coronavirus for the rest of our lives. absent a medical sure is any period of time for it to run its on your research? >> the trouble is we just do not know. we are in the dark as much as people were back in 1918. one of the most terrifying things about the virus is we can't just say this is an ordinary flu pandemic it's not really flu at all. there's also a book out about it in a recent article she said look we could be living with social isolation for at least the next two years. and it may be that no vaccine is available.

maybe within weeks, yes it could be these things. but it is not knowing the gifts to all of us. it was the pain-and-suffering everybody's goes through and it will bring to a lesser extent is the people who can't pretend they death beds of their ones and going to funerals. as i said before it is a huge crisis and i don't think we will go through it anytime soon. i guess we will learn to live with it at something we've had to live with this sort of terrorism, it's horrible that we acknowledge in the way that others never did. >> host: how did the spanish flu, the 1918 flu and? >> good question. the most reliable sources that

i have looked at suggest that it died by attrition. it became weaker and weaker. it absorbed among the population. you could say it was example of herd immunity was certainly discredited to suggest we should allow coronavirus to have the population and a level of do or die. but yes, general understanding it just became weaker and weaker and died away. >> obviously we don't think that will happen with the coronavirus. would be great if it did. went to the authorities think the spanish flu lingered on until about 1920. john barry who wrote a huge book about the spanish flu in the states, apparently trained someone in his family died of it in 19209. it's quite remarkable that it

stayed until that point. and i would like to examine that in detail but wherever that person was when they succumb to it. >> the last question we are going to take is from kerri. knowing that your book is so reliant on first-person accounts, have you been keeping a written record of your experiences in the current pandemic for the future? and what do you encourage people to write about so that future historians will have the type of personal account that helped you guys? >> many questions. yes i have, also a lot of companies are encouraging people to do that. you've got people to do a coronavirus diary. i keep a diary and have done so for years. i just put down little snippets of things people are seeing in the grocery store or

scoundrel that's been reported to do with it. but keep track of it but after this i don't think anyone will write about it in a significant way. the most presses of two pages just saying thank you for publishing my book and this is how you guys handled it. i think it's got a people can keep a diary anyway there's project called maxim in the uk were people went to the churches and factories and schools and were encouraged to say with their life was like. course and has had fascinating results. >> a real diary : : :

we will put that link back up again for everyone who is joining us. thank you for being with us. thank you, everyone for coming, we have enjoyed this conversation. >> you are watching booktv on c-span2, top nonfiction books and doctors every weekend,