>> rose: welcome to the program. we begin this evening with misty copeland, a principal dancer at the american ballet theater. >> i was the only black woman in a company of 80 dancers for a decade. i had to learn different ways of getting my voice heard of -- i think i just had to take a different route. i couldn't just sit back and rely on my talent to get me there. i had to understand how to communicate with my artistic director, to say what i wanted, to express how much i valued my career and respected what i did and i think that goes a long way when you're looking at how i've approached everything else in my career. >> rose: we continue with howell raines, former alabamaian and editor of "new york times"

who talks about harper lee's new book, "go set a watchman." >> i think it's a very good book. the part of me that set out to be an english professor before i got kidnapped by newspapering thinks this is a very significant moment in terms of literary scholarship, and i'll tell you why -- here we get to see the growth process of a writer starting out and feeling her way toward the writer she wanted to be toward the story that she wanted to tell, then abandoning it and giving ate more polished expression. >> rose: we conclude this evening with charles kaiser. his new book is about courage at the time of the french resistance during world war ii. >> what's important to remember is that in the two days after the normandy invasion, there were 1,000 acts of sabotage carried out by the resistance to prevent the germans from being able to reinforce the troops

after the invasion. and de gaulle and eisenhower says in his memoirs over and over again how grate offful he was. >> rose: copeland, raines and kaiser when we continue. >> rose: funding for "charlie rose" has been provided by: >> rose: additional funding provided by: >> and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide. captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: misty copeland is here. last month, she became the first african-american woman to be named a principal dancer in

american ballet theater's 75-year history. the news came a few days after her new york debut swan lake. copeland began her ballet training at the unusually late age of 13 and has overcome numerous obstacles to achieve the highest honors in dance and become a rare pop culture celebrity. here is a look at her recent profile on cbs "60 minutes." >> misty copeland will tell you she's never more arrive than when she's on stage on her toes her athleticism and grace on full display. she can leap through the air she can spin on a dime. she can make you believe she's a swan by a lake. you feel comfortable up there. >> yes. something happens when you feel that energy and excitement from the audience and you do, i don't

know four pirouettes, you jump higher than you ever have and it's just this really magical thing that happens in those moments. (cheers and applause) >> rose: i am pleased to have misty copeland at this table for the first time. welcome. >> thank you so much for having me. >> rose: good to see you. nice to see you. >> rose: are you better because you took the arduous journey you took to be where you are? >> it's hard to say but i think because of all the obstacles and the way i grew up and my life experiences, i think that it's made me fight harder, it's pushed me to be better and not take things for granted so maybe it has. >> rose: it is a lesson in will it's a lesson in support it's a lesson in belief. what else made it happen? >> talent. >> rose: of course talent. yeah, you know.

it's so rare to make it. >> rose: but was it talent you developed or talent you began with? >> i think a combination. >> rose: always. always. i don't think i could have made it with four years of training into american ballet theater, one of the top companies in the world. that's very unusual and that's because i had a lot of natural ability and talent. >> rose: and for a dancer, what does that mean? >> for a dancer, you spend all of those years of training as a child because it has to become so engrained in your muscle memory, and you have to mold the body to do these things because it has to be second nature, once you get to this point when you're on stage and you have to become an artist. i only had four years to do it so a lot of it was naturally there. the line of my muscles and the flexibility i had naturally and even my musicality and my ability to pick up movement. >> rose: but was it more likely you could do it with the body you had than otherwise?

somebody else might have wanted miffed, but it wouldn't have worked because of something physically, the same way the great tennis star said to me there is something about the way my shoulder works that enables me to serve the way i do. >> absolutely, i think that's something that helped me get there quickly because my body was capable of supporting myself because of the muscle development i had naturally because of the flexibility i had, but it's also a mind connection i had to my body. you can have the ideal ballet body but it doesn't mean you will be able to understand and go on stage and perform. there are so many elements that come into play at this level. >> rose: i was going to ask you, as you were talking, what's the difference between skill and artartistry? >> artistry is something that i think you have to have an innate understanding and ability to come alive on stage and not every dancer has that.

then the ability to understand how to become a character and thousand portray a character and for it to be able to read to the top tier at the metropolitan opera house. and then there's the technique you learn from having good training from understanding how it works, working clean and strong and being consistent there are just so many elements. >> rose: but i'm struck by it, too, because i mean, it is like -- it is, in many ways, about fundamentals. we talked about the audience, you talk about the art you talk about the the skill, you talk about the body, you talk about you know, the will power and all the best instruction you could possibly get in teaching, you know, it's a combination of all those kinds of things, but you almost have to approach it as a craft. >> absolutely. >> hunt: i>> rose: i have to do this and this and h this, you know. >> yes. i think we're so similar we are

athletes and are so similar to athletes that compete and perform at the highest level but, at the same time our ability to become artists really separates us from that, the sensitivity that you have to have in becoming these characters on stage again it's very detail oriented, but you also have to allow yourself to be in the moment and take in whatever it is that you're getting from the audience. >> rose: are you competing -- athletes compete with -- >> with other people. >> rose: -- with other people. who are you competing with? >> definitely with yourself. i think that every time for me when i step on to the stage it's live. you have to be so focused in that moment and it doesn't matter how many performances you do in a two-month season, every single time you get on stage, it has to be like it's the first time, because there are people in that audience who have never

seen you before. >> rose: there is a famous baseball story about i think joe dimaggio who even though it was at the end of the season and even though it didn't matter, he ran to first base, did everything that he did as if it was the world series. and someone said, you don't need to do this. the season is over. >> right. >> rose: and he said, there is somebody in this stadium who's never seen me and i want them to see me at my best. >> it's true. and i think there is something just engrained in us as athletes the discipline, and there is just something that you get so used to that pattern and way of working that you just have to finish and be your best all the time. >> rose: have you ever had the thought that if i didn't have to struggle so much, if it had been easier if there weren't so many obstacles, i would have been better sooner? >> no. i think, had i startooner, i would have been better sooner.

i think what likely helped me from my background was my ability to use all those experiences to become an artist. i think having life experiences -- >> rose: evolved. -- yeah, allowed me to have a better understanding of what it is to be a person at a young age. i think a lot of athletes, but a lot of dancers, you know, you're in a very secluded atmosphere, and you spend so much time in the studio that you don't really have the experiences a lot of people have, you know, dating and going to parties. you're in the studio and then, all of a sudden, you get into a professional company and it's, like, here you go, you're an adult and you have to become part of it. >> rose: but do you in any way think you've missed something because of that, or has it been such a love affair it doesn't matter? >> i don't regret one thing. >> rose: you don't regret a

single minute spent in the studio? >> not at all. it's made me -- i don't think i could have become the woman that i am today without ballet and all of the experiences i've had because of this career. >> rose: the woman i am meaning the person you are, the values you have. >> everything, to be as empathetic as i am as sympathetic, to be as strong, intelligent, open loving and caring, i don't think i could have become all of those things without classical ballet. >> rose: people also think you're savvy. >> okay. >> rose: does that fit comfortable on your shoulder? >> yeah, sure. >> rose: they think you're savvy because you understand the world, you really understand the ballet world, the social media world you understand the environment you live in, a and you understand how to master it. >> mm-hmm. i think that's something that i developed because of my experiences of being alone in a ballet company meaning i was the only black woman in a company of

dancers in a decade. i had to learn different ways of getting my voice heard, of -- i think i just had to take a different route. i couldn't just sit back and rely on my talent to get me there. i had to understand how to communicate with my artistic director, to say what i wanted, to express how much i valued my career and respected what i did and i think that goes a long way when you're looking at how i've approached everything else in my career and i think that's hard for a lot of dancers to do. we just don't ever develop those skills when you're in a ballet company. everything is taken care of for you. we're almost treated like students our entire career, so it's not an environment that really nurtures that type of -- >> rose: a wholesome sort of thing. it's not a normal existence. >> no. >> rose: and you have to make sure that that aspect of your own humanity has a chance to grow.

>> right. it just doesn't happen for a lot of people, and i felt, if i was going to succeed in the ballet world and in american ballet theater, i had to make a lot of these things happen for me. >> rose: you are now the principal dancer at the the american ballet theater, as good as it gets i assume. have you just begun to develop all that you can be as a dancer? >> absolutely. i think maybe it's last season that i really started to feel that i had a hold on what it was i was really doing. again, so much came really naturally for me. but there are no short cuts in ballet. so as much as everything was sort of easy for me to do in terms of movement, there were a lot of holes, i think, in my training and in my understanding of what it was to really be a ballerina, and i feel i'm just now kind of honing that. it's exciting that i have so

much ahead of me, i have opportunities to do these roles that i am just now starting to do for, i don't know five to ten more years. >> rose: who's had the most influence on you? >> raven wilkinson i would say african-american former ballerina in monte carlo. she has just taught me what it is to have just pure heart and love for what she did, for her ballet career for ballet for dance. she comes to all my performances, and i've never once heard her complain about her career and the things she didn't get to do because she was a black woman but what she learned from it and her being in my life, and she said to me when i was promoted, that she didn't think she would ever see that in her lifetime. >> rose: she didn't think she

would see it in her lifetime. >> so -- >> rose: a black woman -- so it means so much we're sharing this together. >> rose: you would think not just because we made enormous strides and have a long way to go, we see that every day in contemporary society, but art is supposed to be a place that recognizes talent. that's what art's about not color. >> right. >> rose: not anything else. yeah. >> rose: how good are you? am i right? >> yeah. >> rose: or -- i think you have to be extremely gifted to get into an elite, international ballet company. >> rose: that's the perception. >> yes. but once you get there, it doesn't matter how gifted you are, it's what you do with the opportunities that you have and

it's just been a tough path because i was the only one and there'd never been an african-american woman to make it to this level at american ballet theater. >> rose: so, therefore, you feel what responsibility? >> you know, i feel like i've given myself this responsibility, and that is to be the voice of so many african-american dancers that didn't get the opportunities that i have that didn't have a voice, to try and educate a broader audience on what the classical ballet world is, and all those african-american women who came before me and helped create this path for me. >> rose: i can imagine it is a bit like for young african-american girls like it was for -- i mean so many -- i saw so many tears in 2008 on the part of african-american men and women of age because they never thought they'd see it, and they

saw a man at the congress putting his hand on the bible as the next president of the united states. they never thought they would see it. that's the way it is with you. they're going to see you dance across the stage and say if misty can do it, i can do it. >> that's what i hope. that's why i have been so outspoken, and i wanted to be that person for those people, and i didn't want it to be about me. i wanted it to be about what i represent and what the future of ballet could hold for so many. >> rose: it's incredible. take a look at. this this is a clip. here it is. ♪ ♪

♪ >> it's like this contrast of being extremely wild and animalistic, but at the same time having to have a sense of control. yvonne captures me entertains me. >> she's a fire bird. there is just something about her. i've never seen anything like it before. all i want to do is touch her and every time i try to do that she tries to shy away and that's when you see those moments.

>> the great thing about the choreography is it's a struggle. the choreography and the story is a struggle, so it has to be there, so you can't rehearse it to the point where it's too easy, which is what we do with ballet dancing. ♪ ♪ >> rose: that's from a brilliant documentary by rick burns and it was fire bird. what did you say at the end? do you remember? >> that what we strive for in the studio and work so hard for is to make it look effortless and easy and something that was being created with the story fire bird is that it should look like a struggle. so it was a challenge of not

overrehearsing so that it became too effortless. >> rose: what's the visualization for you as a dancer? >> you mean -- >> rose: what are you thinking in your head as you execute the moves? are you seeing -- i mean, i can relate this to sports only. if you are shooting a basket -- >> right. >> rose: -- your friends can literally see it before it leaves his hands can see it swishing through the net. >> yes, it's similar but it doesn't happen in those moments. that's something that we almost do in preparation to be able to prepare. you want to visualize what it is you want it to be. but in those moments and the reason we rehearse over and over and over again is because, when you're in the moments you're not thinking about the steps. you are so in it that you are that character and you're living as that character.

>> rose: in swan lake, do you think of yourself as a swan? >> yes, you have to. >> rose: the movement of a swan? >> you know, i think that something, for me it's number one. it's being the artist and being the characters on stage. it's so much more to me than executing these steps. that's what makes people feel. that's what art is about. >> rose: it's art. yeah it's not coming to see if someone's going to execute these steps that i'm sure thousands and millions of people could do. >> rose: it's what they do that speaks to your heart. >> right. >> rose: to elevate your emotions. >> yes. >> rose: does body shape make a difference? >> it's definitely one of the requirements when it comes to this art form that you're supposed to look a certain way and i think skin color goes along with that.

but my belief is that -- and with my own experience, i had the ideal body when i started ballet but then i went through puberty and my body completely changed and i wasn't seen as the ideal ballerina anymore. but i think we have the ability to eat in a certain way and do cross training and with all that we know about how to take care of our bodies these days, that you can get it to be the shape and i think that's something i've done with my body. >> rose: do you know anybody that you believe has more will power than you? >> oh, i don't know. >> rose: you can't imagine it? you can't imagine anybody willing to work harder to mold her body, to practice more, to be the best? >> you know, i think that dancers are rare people, and what we sacrifice and commit to

do what we do with our bodies, we give our lives to be a part of this. there are no daifs -- there are no days you can take off. what i have to say about me personally is that beyond my career that the american ballet theater, and i think what makes me even more of a harder worker is what i'm doing outside of my career at a.b.t. it doesn't mean i'm taking off to do these things, like help create a project which is a diversity initiative, to be a part of the boys and girls club, be an ambassador and talk to children and write a memoir because i know what my story can do for so many people, that's all overtime because i'm passionate about changing the world of ballet. >> rose: changing ballet. yes. >> rose: so that it's open to more young african-american girls or --

>> minorities in general. >> rose: minorities in general. >> yes. and i think just educating the broader world on what classical ballet is. the beauty in it. what it can do for so many. i think just in america, people just don't know about it and i think that's why for so many years, they said the art form is dying. >> rose: here's what i would think, and you help me understand this i assume you are enormously popular because of the commercials for underarmor. you probably reached a lot more people than you will reach the rest of your dancing life probably. does it give you power does it give you, misty copeland, you're more than a principal dancer. your name your image of power? >> i think that the power that it gives me is for people to see me and hear me and -- >> rose: and want to sea and

hear you. >> right. i've wanted my voice to be heard for so long, and this is a platform, those opportunities to be seen is a platform for people to know what it is i'm saying and hear it. >> rose: and what you have been through. >> and what i have been through. >> rose: you said almost with your voice cracking, i want them to know -- you know... >> yeah, i think that -- >> rose: i want them to know what i have been through. i want them to know what i can represent. >> yes. i think that it's so important for people to understand that racism still exists and it exists in the ballet world, and it's very difficult and it's as simple as looking at these top ballet companies and how weird it is to see minority dancers. i think a.b.t. at this point is

really setting the new standards, not with just me but with the promotion of another filipino woman promoted the same day as me. she was i believe the first filipino woman to ever be a principal dancer and i think a.b.t. is really standing up and saying this is the direction classical ballet should be going. >> rose: knowing how strongly and deeply and passionately and eloquently you feel about this does anybody ever say, just dance? >> yes absolutely. i have my days where it's, like, i don't want to talk. i was trained to be a dancer and i never liked talking which is probably why i was drawn to dance. but i think that part of my purpose is not just to be a ballet dancer, but it's to speak about these issues in the classical ballet world, and not everyone is going to agree with

me, not everyone is going to understand it, and it's not for everyone, but for those that are -- it's reaching in that it's affecting and that it's maybe changing their lives those are the people that it's for. >> rose: take a look at this, this is from rick burns great documentary american ballet theater history. theory is misty copeland. >> wow... ♪ it's amazing to be involved in celebrating the history of this company. i came to a.b.t. for the first time when i was 16. i joined the company when i was about 19. it's been my dream from the time i knew what ballet was to be a part of this company because i knew the difference of the ballets they do and the fact that we have theater in our name sets us apart from so many other

classical companies. a.b.t. is all of those things and always has been. and i think it's so diverse, to be a black woman and to be a part of it is even more special. and the fact that an african-american woman to be on this ballet set that road for me and made it seem more tangible. i'm so proud to be part of this because it's american and represents what america is. >> rose: wow. does part of you think you can fly? >> i think you have to believe that. you have to have an imagination. you have to believe all those things when you're on stage and performing. (laughter) >> rose: back to the question of the pioneer that you are, do you think when -- and i'm asking

this almost naively but i'm generally asking this -- when people see you dancing with all the extraordinary gifts you have, do you think they see a black woman or simply a brilliant ballerina? >> i would like to think that they see me as a ballerina, as a dancer, but my experience is and the reality of this world is that there are some people that see me as a black woman up there or that thought or think that i don't fit? in. but i try to be the best dancer and artist that i can be because when it comes down to it that's what i'm working so hard for day in and day out. >> rose: to be the best dancer. >> yes. >> rose: this is the underarmor commercial which has been viewed more than 8 million times. here it is. >> dear candidate, thank you for your application to our ballet

academy. unfortunately, you have not been accepted. you don't have the right feet ac you have the wrong body for ballet, and at 13 you are too old to be considered. >> rose: misty, thank you. pleasure to have you here. congratulations on all that you have done. >> thank you very much. >> rose: we'll be right back. stay with us.

>> rose: "to kill a mockingbird" is one of the most cherished and popular books in american literature. it was released in 1916 and inspired a generation of civil rights activist and literature lovers. harper lee wrote another book three years before mockingbird called "go set a watchman." the seek sequel withheld. protagonist atticus finch you're calling him a bigot. howell raines is former executive editor for the "new york times" and won a pulitzer prize about a book he wrote about the south and i'm pleased to have him at the table. welcome. >> thank you. >> rose: the following quote

was made, how can the saintly atticus described earlier in the book in much of the same terms as mockingbird suddenly emerge as a bigot? you know this. you know literature, you know the south, and you've read part of the book. >> i have to say, not to debate my former colleague and good friend, but i think people who think this book shouldn't have been published and that it's a betrayal by harper lee of her heroic character atticus finch have really got it all wrong. >> rose: how so? because of the nature of the book and because of the sociology and history of the south and because of the literary significance of this day of publication for literary scholarship, and let me walk through those briefly. this book is not just part of

our southern literary tradition, our american literary tradition. this book is part of the global, intellectual heritage. 40 million copies taught in 70 countries around the world it's important we know everything we can about a landmark work like that. secondly from a sociological point of view, harper lee has very bravely given us another picture of the south 20 years after the wonderful coming of age story of "to kill a mockingbird," and in that we see -- >> rose: and she covers it 20 years later. they're both written around the same time in the '50s. >> that's right. the picture she gives us 20 years after scout and jim's idyllic childhood with this

heroic father shows us what really happened sews logically in the south at that time. i was there, i lived this period. good people in the white community who had been in favor of equal treatment before the law, let's say and for more humane racial relations hit a wall in the circa 19 -- well, after the supreme court decision in 1954. >> rose: brown vs. board of education. >> --they simply said too much too fast. this was a widespread phenomenon. most were focused on heroic civil rights movers or demonic klans people but we're focusing on upper-middle class, good-intentioned people who went to church who found they could not get over this hump. >> rose: couldn't get over it because the resistance and the

economic sierk logical price they'd pay? >> couldn't get over it. the term one heard and heard it at dinner tables from one's relatives, friends and one heard it at church, too much too fast, moving too far too fast. we're not ready. those people would actually have an intellectual awareness and a moral awareness that segregation had to end but they were gradualists, and they simply -- for a southerner to cross the racial divide in that time to say, come into sympathy with what martin luther king was saying and the sight movement was sigh and what black people aspired to, a white southerner of that time simply had to say to himself, setting aside all the details about the

constitution and the different educational level, they are right and we are wrong and that generation in particular -- atticus finish's generation, the greatest generation in the most important war of the century simply were not the greatest generation when they got home after the war and confronted the rising expectation. >> rose: after world war ii? after world war ii. >> rose: is it a good book? i think it's a very good book. the part of me that set out to be an english professor before i got kidnapped by newspapering thinks this is a very significant moment in terms of literary scholarship, and i'll tell you why. here we get to see the growth process of a writer starting out and feeling her way toward the writer she wanted to be, toward

the story she wanted to tell, then abandoning it and giving it a more polished expression. now, the analogy i would make is this -- hemingway in his life published only 50 short stories for public consumption. after his death, his nick adams stories he wrote struggling to become the writer he begame, there was criticism from hemingway estate, from the point of literary scholarship, it's exactly the right thing to do, and from the point of literary scholarship, harper lee and her family and lawyer are exactly right to publish this book. it is very good on its own merits. this is in the southern cannon and will remain there along with writers like o'connor, faulkner

stein, price, exactly. >> rose: you can put this in the southern canon it's a piece of southern literature. >> absolutely. >> rose: tell me about harper lee. why did she stop? >> that's very interesting. i have been reading the two best biographies we have about her and they're incomplete because she wouldn't give complete access. apparently, she was so traumatized by the fame that hit her in 1960, '61 when this book came out and when alan pecula bought the film right and made into it this mag i have in -- magnificently successful film which made her even more famous she did not like the celebrity and she formed, according to the biographies, an almost parish that dislike of newspaper

people. people -- passionate dislike of newspaper people. she thought they were, as she put it, bad modern practitioners of a formerly honorable profession. now, we can speculate why she reacted so adversely to a level of adulation that other important writers relished or at least learned to tolerate. there have been a lot of speculations about that. some of it completely erroneous one of the most flagrant being truman capote, her dear friend, helped her write the book. not true at all. there have been other speculations she didn't want her personal, private life gone into. the world was still pretty tiny. >> rose: everybody knows everybody. >> yeah, and its major industry is "to kill a mockingbird."

cafes, boo radley's restaurant. it became a boost to a town that doesn't have the anchors many alabama towns have. let me say this about that part of the black belt. many of the black and white families there of the same name. two communities that, while divided by segregation new one another in the most intimate way, not just in terms of procreation but daily life. in camden, the next town over, there was a minister kennedy who

discovered the african-american population and started writing about it in the christiansencally in the '30s. my friend at the university of birmingham did a biography of him and ran into the same problem in the '60s atticus finch did. he was much farther down the road toward being an integrationist than atticus finch was but he had the same sense of fairness and the same sense we are doing evil to these people who have done us no harm and have been at our side for a century. but even he couldn't get quite that last step. >> rose: i don't understand what the last step is. >> i fall back on the simplistic explanation of you have to say in the main, they are right and

we are wrong and this is adverse to the southern personality. you know that from your own experience in north carolina. alabama is the hot center of defiance, even at the expense of self-punishment, and harper lee writes about it in passing in this book. she talks about the blend of the celtic peoples who settled the south and provided the great soldiers of the civil war, the great soldiers of world war ii and all the american wars, defiance and a sense of agreement, of being looked down upon, is very much a part of that psyche. >> rose: probably influenced by reconstruction and all that, too. >> oh, yeah, but still exists today. >> rose: and the flip side of that, and the side i believe in, is that we are still paying a

price for the slavery and we just had a brilliant writer here to talk about it coates, that we're still paying a price and that it is deep in the psyche. >> it is. let me circle back to that recapturing the point about the southern canon. william faulkner said the only subject for the novelist is the human heart in conflict with itself. that is what harper lee is saying by giving this permission for this book to be published, atticus finch is a man who exemplifies, in the full southern it iteration, the human heart an conflict within himself, a man who said my primary principle is equal protection under the law for everyone and no special privilege for anyone. and yet when his daughter comes

home from new york, he tells her, we don't want them in our schools, we don't want them -- and, you know now, harper lee is not free of her own prejudices. in both of these books the picture of white people who are not part of the managerial affluent class in these small towns are looked down on as totally worthless, unredeemable red necks. >> rose: great to have you here. >> thank you charlie. >> rose: howell raines. back in a moment. stay with us. >> rose: charles kaiser is here. his uncle henry was an american soldier, lived with a french family for a year after the liberation of paris. three of the families siblings andre, christian and jacqueline, were active members of the french resistance, the family never discussed the wartime experiences with anyone for 50

years. kaiser's book "the cost of courage" recalls the story of their heroism and sacrifice. pleased to have you at the table. welcome. >> thank you, charlie. >> rose: how did you get on to this story? it is a fascinating story of how the resistance is a connection just among those who were within the resistance but everybody in the family. >> everybody in the family. i've known them since 1962 and i've known the story since i was a little child because of my uncle who lived with them right after the liberation in 1944. he lived with them for a year and told me all the most dramatic stories he'd heard from him. >> rose: he evidently was a great story teller. >> he was an amazing story teller and man great lawyer, represented the musicians and bakers. whenever i was a child, we visited france, there was a family we stayed with and i fell in love with christian when i

was 11. i'm still in love with her. i saw her in paris when i was there last and she's 91 and still in great shape. >> rose: the family didn't talk about this. >> their family suffered so much because of the heroism of these three that they never spoke about it among themselves or with their own children or with anyone else. >> rose: these are the three siblings. >> yes jacqueline, christian and andre. andre dies in a plane crash in 1978, jaqueline dies of cancer in the $1,990 and christian knows the story will die with her if she does don't something about it. she is a man of duty so she hired a research sippet and forced her to write 40 pages for her grandchildren. at that point, the door was open. i saw that got that, translate it into english right away and from that moment on she was not

eager but willing to talk about the story. >> rose: great stories here. tell me about the recruitment of andre. >> andre is an inspector in the department of bridges and highways and his older brother is recruited at the end of 1940 by his boss at the finance ministry. the boss being andre postelle vine. andre asked the older brother to come to the resistance and he said, no, but you talk to my little brother andre and he'll come in. he did and stayed in till 194 the when he's told the gist tapo is going to arrest him. he escapes to pain, arrested, escapes, eventually makes contact with the british consul in madrid, who gets him on an airplane in england in may 1943, meets charles de gaulle, wants to go back to france when the allied invasion takes place and

de gaulle says no, i need you in occupied paris, you will be my military delegate in paris. >> rose: he represents charles de gaulle in paris? >> yes. >> rose: leader of the free french in london. >> leader of the free french in london, in charge of coordinating the resistance movements in the nine northern departments of france which he does from september of 43 dtd until january of '44, when one of his aides is arrested talks and leads the guess guess gestappo to him. they wound him. andre has a cyanide pill in his pocket he had since he returned from england. he always said if the germans get me i'll take the pill.

he said, i was on the floor blood coming out of my stomach everything is ruined, i'm not taking the pill. >> rose: so he goes to the hospital. >> they go to the hospital, sew him up because they want to make him talk. he gets in a room by himself with curtains going up to a skylight and he's a little out of it after being operated on and decides he can climb up the curtains to the skylight, gets halfway up, falls back to the floor, pops all of the stitches and two months later is shipped off to auschwitz and then two other places and amazingly survives all three concentration camps, comes back to france, has become a socialist in the camps, becomes a prominent socialist politician, de gaulle's minister of education in 1958 and what's most extraordinary about this man is this survivor of three german concentration camps devotes the rest of his

public life to reconciliation between france and germany. >> rose: and his relationship to de gaulle did he talk about de gaulle? >> he was suspicious of de gaulle as not being sure that he was a true democrat but was eventually convinced. he became a real de gaulle fan because he and christian and jacqueline in the post-war period agreed the most important thing for france to do is leave algeria and they think that de gaulle is the only one with the strength to do that which in fact was the case. >> rose: the tragedy of this story is some people don't survive. >> several members to have the family not involved in the resistance do not survive were arrested three weeks before the liberation, they come for christian, christian is not there so they take people there in her place they are shipped off to the last train to germany and die in the camps. >> rose: three weeks before the end of the war.

>> three weeks before the end of the war last train to germany, hence the name of the book, "the cost of courage." >> rose: what do you want us to understand about the resnins. >> well, i want people to realize it existed. people would say regularly to me, oh, was there a french resistance? >> rose: why would they say that? >> because there is a knee-jerk reaction on the part of many americans that france didn't behave well during world war ii, and certainly it is a very mixed record. >> rose: well, that is true. that is true, but they lost 90,000 troops in the two months they were at war and they lost 350,000 civilians during the war and a lot of -- >> rose: what percentage of the members of the resistance? >> probably a relatively small numberer are members of the resistance but many killed in retaliation for acts carried out by the resistance. what's important to remember is

that in the two days after the normandy invasion, there were is thousand acts of sabotage carried out by the resistance to prevent the germans from being able to reinforce the troops after the invasion, and eisenhower says in his meme wires over and over again how grateful he was and this was the equivalent of having 15 divisions, the activities. >> rose: he said france has been an inestimatable value. without them there have been much greater losses to ourselves. even though de gaulle was a pain in the butt. >> de gaulle was a pain in the butt. roosevelt hated him. churchill was suspicious of him but realized how important he was, and churchill is the guy clever enough to realize in april 1944 that it will be really important that french troops participate in the liberation of paris. so he sends a message to eisenhower saying please get

some french troops to france, which eisenhower does in july and, indeed, it is general lecleric who commands the rooms who liberate the forms in august. >> rose: de gaulle comes in when? >> at that moment and gives a famous speech saying the real france has always been the resist pt france. >> rose: who are the famous members of the resistance. >> andre monroe, monjo was the most famous. mital was in the resistance those he had a previous life before he was in the resistance when he was on the other side. there are a lot of people. and andre was one of the most famous people. >> rose: one of the most famous people -- >> who had been in the resistance by the time in 1978 the mayor of a small town on the bored were germany and chief

spokesman on the party with economic affairs and probably poised to become the first socialist finance minister after world war ii but dies in a terrible plane crash two years before he becomes finance nine industry. >> rose: what are the most vivid memories of christian. >> i said after i had known her for a number of months and said it must have been romantic to have been in the resistance. she said it was not romantic! >> rose: it was about fear. it was about fear and being suspicious of everyone you knew all the time but it was the most intense experience of your life and after the liberation she feels the terrible void. >> rose: and when you say to them why did they do it, what do they say? >> she said it was obvious. she comes from this family which have been civil servants and judges in paris for three centuries and she has brought up above all to be a patriot and she comes back to paris after

the occupation begins and sees these german soldiers goose stepping and says this is wrong. >> rose: the book called "the cost of courage" by charles kaiser, thank you. >> thank you very much. >> rose: thank you for joining us. see you next time. for more about this program and earlier episodes visit us online at pbs.org and charlierose.com. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> rose: funding for "charlie rose" was provided by: additional funding provided by: >> and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide.

every single bite needed to be -- >> twinkies in there. it's like a great big hug. >> about as spicy as i can handle. my parents put chili powder in my baby food. >> french fries all over the table. >> a lot of chewing.