>> rose: welcome to the program. we begin this evening with the presidential press conference and the reaction with al hunt, mark landler, chuck todd, and major garrett. >> the default scenario is the last, bgest, and most historically important forcing mechanism ever and to pick up on al hunt's point, if that is not the forcing mechanism, if that's not the vice that takes these disparate interests and shoves them together if even for six or eight weeks we have entered a fundamentally new era of politics where political indecision and the inability to reach compromise and a deal-- even an unsatisfactory one-- begins to inflict economic harm not just here but throughout the global economic system. >> rose: we continue with a conversation with margaret atwood. >> i think the theme is probably

like a lot of books of this kind about imagined futures. the theme is really in the nature. so who are we really? what are we capable of? how far can we change without ceasing to be ourselves? >> rose: we conclude with eileen rockefeller. you say "without anxiety and desire to heal it i would not be writing this story." >> yes. you know, i think anxiety is a great motivator and that when you can work through it, it brings you to whole new places in life. so for me this book was aout healing my relationships with my family and really coming into a new place as eileen, myself. >> rose: a program note:sting was to be on this evening's program but because of the presidential press conference he will appear later this week. tonight, government shutdown continues, margaret atwood a

eileen rockefeller when we continue.

captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> myysuggestion to the speaker has been and will continue to be let's stop e excuses, let's take a vote in the house, let's end this shutdown right now. let's put people back to work. there are enough reasonable republicans and democrats in the house who are willing to vote yes on a budget that the senate has already passed. that vote can take place today. >> rose: it is day eight of the government shutdown. president obama spoke at the white house this afternoon. he urged house republicans to pass a clean funding bill to reopen the government. he also used tough language to criticize their tactics. >> the point is, i think not only the white house but also democrats in the senate and democrats in the house have shown more than ample willingness to talk about any issues the republicans are concerned about.

but we can't do it if the entire basis of the republican strategy is "we're going to shut down the government or cause economic chaos if we don't get 100% of what we want." >> rose: speaker boehner responded after the president's press conference. he argued that the debt limit had been fair game for negotiations in the past. also stressed that talks are to start today. >> we can't raise the debt ceiling without doing something about what's driving us to borrow more money and to live beyond our means. the idea that we should continue to spend money that we don't have and give the bill to our kids and our grand kids would be wrong. that suspect about me and, frankly, it's not about republicans. this is about saving the future for our kids and our grand kids. the only way this is going to happen is to, in fact, have a conversation. so it's time to have that conversation. not next week, not next month. the conversation ought to start toda >> rose: joining me from the

white house, major garrett, he is chief white house correspondent for cbs news. also in washington, chuck toad, chief white house correspondent for nbc news. and albert hunt, columnist in for bloomberg view. joining us shortly, mark landler white house correspondent for the "new york times." welcome one and all. let me just start. albert, to you and then chuck and then major garrett. did the president say anything new today and has anything changed? albert? >> well, no, i don't think he really did, charlie, except perhaps he made people slightly more aware of the stakes, which are humongous. i've been in this town for a long time and i've watched some pretty bad things: the impeachment of clinn which was a fiasco, a couple government shutdowns. we are headed potentially for something that's so much worse than anything we've ever seen. the shutdown itself is a little league baseball game compared to the world series of fiascos if they let this debt ceiling, if they tolerate it to fall.

i -- all my reporting can't come up with an end game. i still think it won't happen and i think any kind of end game you come up with is only going to kick the can down the road on these other issues. but i think right now we are headed for a potential political and economic cataclysm unless serbia somebody gets wisner the next seven days. >> rose: chuck? >> well, charlie, there was one thing the president did is he put himself out there supporting something that i know that both major and i have been hearing over the last couple of days which is the president will support anything boehner sends him that is quote/unquote "clean without any of those extraneous politically-charged amendments on both a spending bill and a debt limit and he'll tape it for any length of time. so six weeks, eight weeks, something very short term. president very explicit that he'd be willing to sign that and then essentially agree that in that six-week period they'd be locked in some form of negotiations.

he even got into the -- so he sort of outlined what he was willing to say which could be, arguably, a compromise. what was astounding to me is boehner took that offer and called that -- agreeing to that unconditional surrender. so while i was somewhat optimistic that the president was at least painting the kick can can down the road end game scenario that albert was just referring to there, baber's response to it tells you that maybe we should have no hope that this is going to end the way we all thought it was going to end. >> rose: major? >> well, charlie, what we have is a disagreement about how to talk and when to talk. both sides say they're willing to talk. john boehner has now reduced his sum total of demands from house republicans to a conversation. a conversation that has no known or defined conclusion. just a conversation. that's a pretty flexible definition of what republicans would agree to. the president said he's willing to negotiate about a broad number of topics, even changes

to his beloved health care law. so both sides have staked out positions that are negotiable if in fact, they want to find a resolution. >> rose: mark, it was i think last friday that there was a story the times that the speaker had said he would not allow a default. are we --s where that idea now that the speaker will not allow a default. >> well, you know, the speaker is said tohave said this privately to his colleagues. on the weekend, on the sunday shows he painted himself into much tougher corner by saying that the u.s. was on the road to default and he wasn't willing to rule it out and, you know, i think to pick up on one albert said, a big part of the president's message today was his trying to bat down this idea that either a default is inconceivable or that a default isn't as cot strofk as some people would say it is.

he basically made the point that it is everybody t as ruinous as you think it's going to be and he went after people who are trying to argue-- including some republicans-- that we should test the proposition. i think also he was responding a little bit to what we wrote about today which is that the financial markets continue to view default as one hedge fund guy put it as a black swan event. just something that's so inconceivable that it's not really pred into the markets yet. sy think the president was trying to say today it is conceivable. >> rose: there's also this question about negotiations back and forth on this. is the president on firm ground when he says "i'm not going to me gauche@because they ought to do what they are supposed to do. that's what they were hired to do is to pass debt ceiling and also vote on the budget and i don't want to do that. i don't want toto the negotiate because if i do we'll be doing this all the time and we'll get nothing else done."

is he on film ground in making that argument? >> well, i would say that ultimately he's the guarantor of the nation's credit worthiness. so i think it's a difficult argument to say that i'm not going to negotiate because this is what these people are hired to do if you're really staring down the barrel at a default. which is why i think he did open the door to this shorter timetable negotiations, some form of a clean c.r. what the interesting thing about that is he said in the same breath "we can't keep lurching from one manufactured crisis to the other." and that's in fact, what he'd be setting up if he were to engage in some time-bound short period of negotiion. >> rose: chuck, you were shaking your head. >> no, it is. in one breath the president was saying we can't keep doing it this way on the other hand he was basically offering boehner a way out. you know, any time you negotiate with somebody on high stakes and you think that you have to come

to some sort of agreement you want to give your opponent-- even if you think u have to upper hand. i think the president believes he does. i think you look at the polls he believes he does. i think the democrats certainly feel-- and this is senate democrats in particular-- believe that by agreeing to certain spending levels, by agreeing to have this short term that they have already come halfway to the republican position at this point and that they're not g gng to give any more ground until the republicans simply flip the switch on the government and temporarily rai the debt ceiling so as to just shift the cataclysmic event that could take place on october 17, shift it to november 15 or december 1, whatever it is the agreed upon number so i think that it doesn't -- whether he is or not on firm position, i think the president believes politically he's certainly in pretty firm position on this. >> charlie, this is an important note there and the white house wanted to make this cllr after the president's press conference ended that even in accepting a six or eight-week or nine-week

increase of the government's borrowing authority to avoid default, the president would do that with no conditions a alied whatsoever. the white house position is he wants to break-- the president, that is-- wants to break the fever of house republicans either assuming that a default doesn't matter or it's not as economically injurious as the president and other economics say it is and also break the fever that this can be a forcing mechanism in into which they can inject conversations about policy disagreements of long standing with this white house. those are the two things the president wants to do. now, is he on historically accurate grounds saying that the non-negotiating position is tenable? well, if you look at the history of this, no, he's not. other presidents negotiated lots of policy compromises around a debt ceiling increase. the one difference the president makes is under those circumstances the question of default was never a real live time bomb. the president believes it is now and he has to diffuse it and the only way he believes he can diffuse it is to not accept any

conditions at all around a debt ceiling increase. >> rose: charlie, let me jump in. i think you have to differentiate between the shutdown and the debt ceiling. i think the shutdown is something that politicians will play politics with and that's happened before and it will happen again and it's unfortunate, there may be a political price to pay, it's an inconvenience. some people really get a raw deal. but that is a different issue than an actual default. major is right, there have been games before but nothing like this. this is unprecedented. frankly, there should not where a debt ceiling. it's a silly an akronism that is only used by politician but to play -- to get this close to it to play to the point where there is a -- something close to a 50-50 possibility that we'll default is -- this is where the president does have the high ground. much more so than on the shutdown and i can't -- going back to what chuck said before, i can't quite understand john boehner here. there have been so many different john boehners it

depends on the day of the week. he obviously is feeling tremendous pressure. i suspect he hateses his job. and he probably realizes that okay if they do kick the can down the road for six or eight weeks, as chuck said earer, what do you kick the a k down the road to do? the same problems that existed going back to that that supercommittee of two years ago. there's no deal to be had will there. republicans won't -- will only accept a deal that just involves entitlements and democrats say no way they'll do that and don't forget you have congressional democrats as well as obama. so that is a non-starter. so it's hard to fine -- you can do little thing, the medical device tax could go but that' not very big. it's hard to find what a deal would be. >> rose: very quickly, charlie. the issue here is boehner -- this isn't about findg the votes and -- boehner believes th he is holding together such a fragile coalition inside the republican party and the problem is he has a tea party caucus

that, frankly, anything that isn't some sort of unconditional surrender on the president's part when it comes to health care or some of these drawing the lines in the sand on spending, they're not going to accept any form of compromise. boehner knows that so he has to draw this line. but boehner is holding this together. ththisn't about saving his speakership. this is about making sure there isn't open warfare inside the republican party because of a compromise that looks like to the teaarty wing of the party capitulation to the president. if it looks like that-- which is what boehner fears-- then katie bar the door, every republican official is in deep trouble with this fefeent -- it's a minority inside the republican party but it's an active one and they could cause real damage. >> rose: chuck, i know you have to go. thank you so much for joining me. >> you got it, thanks, charlie. >> rose: let me come to you, major. what pressure points remain to be used that have not been used? is anything that is not being utilized to bring some

negotiation or sme capitulation or some blinks that will end up with no disaster on october 17? >> the only one i can think of right now, charlie, is the calendar itself. we are entering a phase of american politics in which external events, forcing mechanisms, appear to be the only way in which congressional republicans and congressional democrats and the president who disagree about issues are forced into an agreement. outside external events, the national process of legislating things, holding votes, having committee meetings, matching legislation and horse trading, all those other historically reliable means of resolving differences do not currently apply, forcing mechanisms from the outside like the pressure of a government shutdown which loomed for a while that we're now into deeply, for the eighth day, that wasn't forcing mechanism enough. the default scenario is the last biggest and most historically important forcing mechanism ever

and to pick up on al hunt's point, if that is not the forcing mechanism, if that's not the vice that takes these didirate interests and shoves them together, if even for six or eight weeks, we have really entered a fundamentally new era of politics where political indecision and the inability to reach compromise and a deal-- even an unsatisfactory one-- begins to inflick economic harm not just here but throughout the global economic system. >> rose: and, mark, if you hear that argument, what do the 20 to 30 members of the republican tea party who are behind this sty that very argument? >> to some extent we haven't really tested it yet in the sense that as we get closer to it and as the markets begin to react that argument will be made to them ever more vividly. i think some of them play it down. some of them try to argue that, well, we don't know whether it's really this calamitous. that's, again, what the president was trying to knock down today in the news

conference. and, you know, he pointed out himself that even flirting with a default as we did the last time was enough to downgrade our debt for the first time in eons and raise our borrowing cts. so as you get into these kind of external events that major was talking about those members of the caucus will have to answer those. and some of the arguments they e making that maybe this is survivable or there's a way to do it that's not calamitous, that will be a harder and harder argument to make. >> rose: the end, al, does the president have to negotiate simply because he cannot allow default because he understands the consequences? >> i honestly don't think he's going to on the question of the debt ceiling. charlie, i think there are two possible escapes, one doubtful, the other dangerous. the doubtful one is that the senate goes ahead and with ten or 12 republicans votes a clean debt ceiling bill and they say okay, we've passed a bipartisan debt ceiling.

the problem is that those 50 or 60 tea party members of the house could care wlaesz those ten or 12 republican senators think. the more dangerous possibility is sort of a replay of the tarp vote in 2008 where we actually go into a default for a day or two and see what a financial cataclysm it is and they quickly rush to try to rectify it. but, boy, that in itself is incredibly dangerous. >> rose: al lab, thank you. mark, thank you so much. major, good to see you. >> good to see you, charlie. >> rose: we'll be right back. stay with us. >> at that point, you put the tail on the head of the zombie and hit it very hard on top with one of the bureau drawers and then you kick it backwards and leap gracefully -- (laughter) (applause) >> rose: margaret atwood is here. she had written more than 40 books of fiction, poetry an critical essays. her work has the rare

distinctioioof attracting both critical and commercial success. her new book, "maddaddam," completes a trilogy that began with "oryx & crake" and continued with "the year of the flood." i'm pleased to have her here at this table again. welcome. >> thank you. >> rose: is a trilogy saturday? >> it was hard for me. >> rose: because? >> it was really long and also i had to keep track of all the little details. sort of like continuity in a film. so if the person has blue eyes in this scene then they've got to have blue eyes in that scene. >> rose: and when you set out the do this, do you doit because you can't put it all in one novel? >> well, i didn't intend to do three when i did the first one but right after they realized there were going to be a lot of questions so i went sbe the corners of that world to explore two other groups of people but it did take me a little bit of

time. >> rose: what's the theme here? the struggle for svival? >> i think the theme is probably like a lot of books of this kind about imagined futures. the theme is really humanan nature. so who are we really. what are we capable of? how far can we change without ceasing to be ourselves? >> rose: do you begin with that big idea that you want to have and then you create characters and then you create what happens to your characters' plot? >> i think i begin by thinking about extinction. >> rose: really. what it would be like if we were all facing engs tings? >> not just us but various other creatures on theelanet who, indeed, are facing extinction. but we have faced extinction in the past several times and we did make it through so we might this time as well. >> rose: this is called speculative fiction. >> that's my term for it. it's in dispute.

(laughs) >> rose: so it's thinking about the future and speculating what it might be and making it fiction? >> for me it means faking about the fiction with things we already have. so 1984 is speculative fiction. "star wars," science fiction fantasy. in another galaxy far, far away. "1984" this planet, stuff we've already got. >> rose: and this is a reference to noah and the origins of the bible? >> to adam, yes. so in the first book, "oryx & crake," there's a web site called mad mad and its logan is "adam named the animals "maddaddam." >> rose: what kind of world are you depicting here? >> i'm depicting two parts of that world, number one, the future before, number two which is when a man made virus wipes out most of us. mad mad..

>> rose: which is a possibility. $yes, people are indeed creating my cobs in thelab. >> rose: that could escape. >> or somebody might take the top off the box on purpose. >> rose: so it could be malicious behavior. >> it could well be. is. >> rose: is there anything different about creating these characters versus other characters? your novels? >> for me no. i like to give my characters a past and i like to let them eat food. so novelists don't allow their characters to eat. the you notice in daschle ham met nobody ever eats. so i like to give them a parent. you'll notice that sherlock

holmes has no parents. he's got a brother but no parents. we never hear about the childhood of young sherlock, do we. >> rose: no. >> but i like to have childhood -- >> rose: you want all of your characters to be fully functioning human beingng >> well, i like to know where they came from. how come they're like that. if. >> rose: how do you explain hour come they're like that? >> well, you know, you never really know, but in a novel ever since the 19th century in "great expectations" we like to know a little bit about the character's childhood. at least i do. >> rose: so what interests you the most in? this line of conversation we're having now, are you interested in politics? are you interested in international terrorism? what is it? >> do i have to choose? (laughs) >> rose: fair enough. but all of these things, it't' a novelist garden. that's where the novelist goes. >> i'm interested in just about everything but not all novelists

are like me. some people wouldn't say "well, i'm interested in my hometown" or "i'm interested in my age group" or "i'm interested in new technologies" or "i'm interested in large friendly dinosaurs." >> rose: or i'm interested in spying. >> yes. in fact, there are associations that you can join, international crime writers and things like that and international thriller writers. >> rose: or science fiction. >> and people get together and discuss things and on twitter, for instance, why is it always in block? those people will answer. and think eel tell me why it's a glock. >> rose: you really are deep into the internet, aren't you? you have 700,000 or something? >> that's not me. that's rob delany. >> rose: how many have you got? >> i've got 426,000. >> are you writing things that you hope will generate more

people? >> i got into this by accident. i was building a web site back in 2009 and they said -- >> rose: what was this called? >> the web site? it was a web site for "the year of the flood" which is the second novel in that federal ji and i'd never built a web site before, i didn't know know anything about that stuff so they said you need to have twitter and i said "what is that?" and they said "oh, it's simple." and i said"what's the point of it?" and they said "give it a try." >> rose: and you gave it a try. and did it resonate with you? >> i had a twitter coach. >> rose: you did? >> yes. who helped me out. and his name is mcchain grieves and you can find him on twitter. >> rose: what did he teach you? >> he said "make it short." and he put a shoutout to a couple of his twitter buddies and so i do that for other

people. >> rose: do you follow people on twiter? >> oh, yes. >> rose: oh, yes, who? >> so i've met people through twit we are, believe it or not. >> rose: they say something interest and you say "i'd like to talk more about that. >> you start a conversation with them and sooner or later there they are at your read or e.m.s. you find yourself -- for instance, neil gay man, i initially interact with him that way and gaye man and we did an event together at the edinburgh book festival. rob delany i haven't met yet but i just got a copy of his yet unpublished book. >> rose: how is it? >> it's extremely funny and quite crude. >> rose: crude? >> as you might expect. >> rose: do you think you could write about pretty much anything? the skills that you have, your core competence is not only command of language, for sure, story telling for sure, and so whether it's science fiction or whether it's crime or whether it's a western or whether it's -- has to do with the drama of a

small town you can do it all because those things -- those skills are transfer to believe all those subjects. >> up to a point. i find it very hard to write from the points of view of people from other countries. >> rose: oh! >> it's not hard to write from the point of view of a tourist in that country. where you basically don't know what's going on. but to be inside of a person from that other country you would really is to spend a lot of time snoochlt. >> rose: does that include britain? >> yes, it includes britain. >> rose: really. >> yes. >> rose: even though you're part of the commonwealth. >> well -- (laughs) we talk different. >> rose: especially you're in quebec. but -- how are you changing? you've had this enormous success and you keep going strong and this is 40th -- is this the 40th? >> i've lost count. >> rose: have you really? what do you think it is? >> we're using the "over" word.

we're saying "i'm over 60 years old. i've written over 40 books. we don't go further than that. >> rose: because you don't care or it's not worth making that delineation. >> it sounds really like a lot. >> rose: it does. well, it is a lot, isn't it? >> it is quite a lot but i have to explain that it's cumulative. so you take the amount of years you've been on the planet and you divide the number of books into that and it's not that prolific. >> rose:py -- maybe a book every two years or -- >> well, that's not really speedy. joyce carol oets was -- >> rose: but she's infamous for how prolific she is. >> famous. (laughs) oates. >> rose: (laughs) i stand corrected. you're right. >> renown. renown. that covers just about everything. >> rose: how about well known? >> well known exs extremely good. you can be well known for just about everything. so, yes, it's not that fast, really, it just builds up and they don't seem to go out of

print so it looks like a lot on the shelf. >> rose: now there's this idea. i had a conversation this week because of an interview i was doing with the "time" magazine writer who has written about how people, he believes, and he uld cite. the picasso is one and einstein maybe is another are creative and that creative abilities grow because the more they learn about brain science they believe that there's a regeneration that takes place and when you marry that experience it adds to your creativity as you get older. are you buying this? >> i'm certainly liking it. buying it and liking it aren't always quite the same but i'll go along that. >> rose: but you're at the height of your powers, are you not? >> who knows. >> rose: you might be getting better next year. >> or i might be getting worse. we'll find out. however we do know-- and this is just in-- that playing certain kinds of video games keeps you from getting dementia.

isn't that good? >> rose: that's very good. we thought it was the death of our children, didn't we? >> yeah, grand theft auto, apparently that's a good one, i'm told. >> rose: you may know better than i but it is true because we worry about the attention span of our children. on the other hand we know that it is in fact certain kinds of video games enhance the neurocircuitry and all that. >> well, this other news just in which is pretty good news -- >> rose: you get a lot of news. >> yes, guess who tells me all this news? my twitter followers. anything that comes across their canvas they tell me. >> rose: couldn't you be doing this all day? >> it certainly sucks you in. >> rose: it does, doesn't it? have you been able to resist being suckd? >> well, i've got other things to do but they do direct you any time. >> rose: here's what i would like that know if you tried this i believe you must have. so you're writing your next

novel and you're letting -- writing chapter by chapter in your -- you want to let your readers know where you're going and what you're doing there becomes a collective among all the people that are twitter -- that follow your tweets with of involvement with your creative process. >> rose: that exists. >> it does. >> rose: it does? with you? >> apparently. it's called watpad and i have done a story on it with a co-writer called naomi alderman and it's called "the happy zombie sun rise home." we did it chapter by chapter and people could follow along as we were doing it. and, no, we didn't have it plotted out ahead of time. >> rose: okay i know about that and i've read about it, too. but i'm asking even if -- suppose you set out to write a novpl and you got a thousand people who follow you and you

really take them along the journey and solicit their opinion for what the character would do. >> that is what happened to charles dickens in the 19th century. >> rose: they would write in. >> they would say "you're being too mean to this character." >> rose: so what do you think about this idea? >> i'm not there yet. >> rose: what would get you there? jo >> i don't think anything would quite honestly because i think what i like with the book is to be able to start on page one ann not know what's going to happen you can do that on watt pad but i also rewrite a lot so where would we be when we're going along to maybe chapter and then i started rewriting chapter two. >> rose: but you get to the end before youry write? >> no, it's a rolling barrage. i rewrite as i go along.

>> rose: if you get to chapter 10 that you won't go back and refix two? >> i might. >> rose: oh so you may be do both. it's always going on at once. >> rose: see i would think there would be easier -- just me. just sort of work back so i want to end up here and have them take this route, this route, this route. this is what's so exciting about what you do. before i get them there i want them to be here and then you can sort of figure out all the things and you can put things in chapter two that we may not take note of by what happens in chapter 5 we see how relevant it was that chance meeting >> edgar allen poe said famously that mystery stories are written backwards. which they have to be. because how can you sprinkle the misleading clues unless you know them. >> rose: i didn't know he'd said

that. >> he invented that form. back in the 19th century with his character who was the granddaddy of all the detectives that we have in fiction today. >> rose: here's my picture of you, all you do all day is read and tweet. >> that's entirely false. i did the ironing. >> rose: do you really. oh you have somebody to do the ironing, don't you? >> no, i think it's very -- >> rose: therapeutic? >> i think it induces ideas to do a repetitive activity that is not connected with writing. >> rose: so while you're there ironing your mind is wandering all over the landscape? >> well, we don't like to put it that way. >> rose: how do you like to put it? >> it is thinking in a focus way about something else. >> rose: are you unlocking a part of your brain that is -- your unconscious brain? >> yeah, i want to say it's something like that but everybody will tell you it's the same thing. >> rose: that they have great

ideas when they're not thinking about it? >> it's the eureka path tub moment. you know, archimedes. >> rose: have you had many eureka bathtub moments? >> not in the bathtub. i like to read in the bathtub. >> rose: while ironing? >> the occasional idea. gardening, digging. >> rose: gardening would be good i would think. >> gardening is good. >> rose: because it gets you outside. that's better. >> yes, as well as you get food. >> rose: what do you not have that you most covetet >> i would like to be all ther. >> rose: would you really? tall is great. >> once upon a time i was the average size for a female person in my generation. >> rose: which was what, 5'6, 5'7? >> you're so cute. 5'4, not an inch less. >> rose: (laughs) but t tey put something in the milk and now you've got all these tall young people and they're really -- >> rose: so the average height of women is growing.

>> it seems to me and it's not just the extra high heels. some new material that causes them not to break. >> rose: so you'd like to be taller. is that the most thing you most confidante? >> i'd like to be an opera singer such as joan sutherland. >> rose: her particularly? >> rose: her particularly but maybe not looking exactly like her. maybe looking a bit different from her. >> rose: maybe a bit taller? >> she was tall. >> rose: was she really. 5 '11? maybe it took a big frame to encompass that -- >> yeah, i wouldn't mind being that tall, i'd just like to look slightly different. different hair. >> rose: a friend of mine has a concept called the ovarian lottery where you were born influences obviously -- >> oh, really. what about when? >> and when, too. >> rose: where and when. >> just before world war ii we wouldn't have had rationing and i would have been all ther. how about that?

-- taller. >> rose: i grew up in the story telling community and that appeals to me. >> so did i because my importants were from nova scotia. >> rose: do they tell stories in nova scotia? >> yes they're oral raconteurs, mostly embarrassing stories about other people in the family. >> rose: one of the thin you've predicted -- we're straight into biography here. one of the things you wrote about was sex enhancement drugs. >> and? >> rose: well, where'd that come from? (laughs) >> out of the newspaper, basically. >> rose: really? what is it, viagra, all that? >> it was post-viagra. viagra had already been invented and there were a million viagra jokes making the rounds. you've heard some of them. >> rose: i did. >> but people then started working on various other -- but this is a very old concept. it used to be called aphrodisiac >> rose: indeed. >> so there's folklore about

that. >> rose: because you're so well read, are there aphrodisiacs that come from some plant and growing only in nova scotia? (laughter) >> i think you should ask them. and if it did they weren't going to tell you! they wanted to keep that to themselves. >> rose: we'll go harvest that place. but, i mean, are there? with your vast knowledge, you read a lot. have there been aphrodisiacs that have been proven to be true? >> i'm not going on the record about that. >> rose: do you know? >> i actually don't know. i don't know how proven to be true it works. so you have to have a control case. >> rose: it seems to me if it was true some pharmaceutical company would have been there. >> unless the substance was so cheap and not copyrighted so that they uldn't make money out of it. like, you know, some sort of herbal tea which they do, of

course, log quite a bit in the rbal tea area. >> rose: so this is coming from me so bear with me. >> are you instigated? >> rose: provocateur. i just feel like provoking today. >> all right, go to it. do your worst. >> rose: every time i -- i'll bet you they're following -- >> how much? >> rose: i'll bet you a hundred dollars or dinner or lunch. >> rose: it's gating cheaper. >> rose: (laughs) no, i eat well. i'll pet you that the most frequent google of you is margaret atwood and "hand maiden's tail." >> oh, you would win that bet. >> see! >> but it's changing. "maddaddam" is now creeping up and i did google today an item that's in the first book whichch

is called "chicky nugs" which is a form of chick than's grown on a headless chick than grows multiple breasts, wings and drumsticks. >> rose: is that right? >> it's fiction. >> rose: it's not in mcdonald's. so you made up a headless chicken? >> i made up a head lech chicken. >> rose: so that's what they reference. >> so if you put chicky nugs on your search -- it says economicy nugs then you find it being used as an item in the language. so it's entered the language. >> rose: what else has etered the lang sfwhaj >> probably "the hearing aid maid's tale" was used quite a lot in the latest presidential election as something

republicans should not do people were saying "please republicans the hand maids tale is not a recipe." >> rose: are you happy? >> am i happy? >> rose: uh-huh. >> of course i'm happy because happiness is a by-product of being interested in what you do. it's not a goal. you don't go out looking for sort of unadulterated happiness unattached to anything else. >> rose: what percentage of people do you think are actually doing exactly what they should do? >> very few. >> rose: it's a sad thing, isn't it? >> well, i think you know what has happened is that people's natural inclinations and capabilities there are not enough places in the world where they can do those things. >>ose: you can love acting but if there's not enough theater -- >> you got it. i did them on the side you usually find in somebody's life or place where they're doing what they like and then they're

having this other thing that they do to make money. >> rose: well, i really like talking to you so sthaung. >> rose: thank you. >> rose: great to see you again. >> rose: this book is called "maddaddam." it's the third in a trilogy, as i said earlier and i'm always pleased to have margaret atwood here. back a n a moment. stay with us. >> i think they now recognize that having wealth if you use it intelligently can be a means of accomplish manager good things and i feel all of our six children use the funds that they have wisely and well and i'm very proud of what they're doing. >> rose: you have said i think before to me you think -- you hope your legacy will be that you have used the wealth wisely. the >> that is certainly true. and along with that i feel very proud of the fact that i brought up six children who were, i

think, going to make their own mark in the world. are making their own mark in the world in a very constructive way. >> rose: one of those children is his daughter eileen rockefeller. she is the great granddaughter of john d. rockefeller, the founder of standard oil. she currently serves as the founding chair of rockefeller felon throepy advisorss well as the family fund. she's written a memoir. it is an explo ration of identity and a look inside of one of the most important american families in all of our histories. it's called "being a rockefeller becoming myself." i'm pleased to have eileen rockefeller at this table for the first time. welcome. >> rose: thank you, charlie, it's a pleasure to be here. >> when you write aook, it's not an easy task as you found out. >> no, it's not. but i have to say that the six years of writing it were a lot shorter than the 61 years it's taken me to become myself. >> rose: (laughs) now what does that mean? 61 years is when you see yourself fully formed and this is what it's about? >> well, i hope i'll never be

fully formed. but i'm evolved enough to be able to incorporate the rockefeller as well as the eileen. >> rose: is it hard to be a rock feller? >> yes. >> rose: because much is expected? >> much is expected. it's both a great opportunity and a challenge. and certainly i have received many, many benefits and along with them come the responsibilities of doing well. >> rose: you say without anxiety and desire to heal it i would not be writing this story. >> yes, you know, i think anxiety is a great motivator and that when you can work through it it brings you to whole new places in life. so for me this book was about healing my relationships with my family and really coming into a new place as eileen, myself. >> rose: why did they need

healing? >> well, every large family has for competition for attention and ironically in a family bring up where there was so much material abundance there was a sense of scarcity that i shared with my siblings for attention. >> rose: meaning that you felt isolated, alone, not -- >> yes, for several reasons. one, because my parents of necessity had to travel a lot and my father was away for business a great deal. and then also being the youngest of six children by three years to the next oldest meant that i wasn't part of sort of the core group at that time. >> rose: so what's the big -- best of the legacy that you had to have? >> i think best of the legacy is a caring for fellow human beings and a deep connection to nature. >>. >> rose: some of that comes from your mother? >> yes, indeed.

my mother was very good at helping us balance the everyday responsibilities and finding, as she needed it, restoration in natu as well as the playfulness. >> rose: i had the good fortune to come to know her and david and to have males there and to flow of her passion. >> oh, she had passion. >> rose: for the land. >> a great passion for the land which she's passed down to all six of her children and it's also a passion for the environment and that is something my husband and i have worked on very hard to help stem global climate -- global warming. >> rose: what do you think of the giving pledge? >> you mean the every opportunity and obligation, every right aresponsibility? every possession a duty? >> rose: (laughs) yes. >> i know it, first of all. i live with it. and i try to do well by it. >> rose: and when you look at the history of the rockefellers,

tell me who the people -- tell me how those that sort of resonated with you. >> well, thene who resonated most with me ironically i never knew personally and that's my grandmother. i actually dedicated the book to my grandmother and my husband paul and i dedicated it to grandmother abby rockefeller for giving me the dream of belonging. i actually did have a dream of her the night that my oldest ununle john died in car crash. and i was in a wilderness area and she came to me in a dream and she was walking through the house my parents had givenen me which had belonged to my grandparents, to her, in their lifetimes. and she was telling me that i could change any of the pictures in this house. they were arthur davies and japanese prints and she said "this house is yours now and you may change the pictures to be whatever you want." and for me that was a

permission-giving dream. >> rose: was there anything in this book that was hard for you to write? >> oh, yes. lots of things. >> rose: which part? >> the things that had to do with my siblings. but the beauty of doing this book is that i have been working with my siblings and they have been been working with me and they've vetted every single chapter that has anything to do with them so i know that it's going out in the world with a kind of partnership and with the new story of our relationship now. >> rose: you could only write it because there there is a new story? >> i'm only interested in publishing it because there is a new story because that's the piece that gives hope to others who will carry -- we all carry around our relationships from our family of origin whether we like them or not and we put the faces of them on our husbands or wives and our friendships and children. >> rose: now, is the story here -- is the essence of this story

"being a rockefeller, becoming myself" that in the end it's love that heals? >> you got it. love that heals. that's right. and it's also that it's not as much whether you have net worth as whether you have self-worth. and i think that's the important mess only along with love because self-love is what ultimately allows you to love others more deeply. >> rose: and how do you find self-love? >> by listening deeply. but getting more accurate mirrors to yourself, people who see you deeply and as opposed to often the family which can see a projection of themselves on to you. >> rose: your mom. you said she's famous for her pranks. >> she was famous for her pranks. she one time put the pictures-- the modern pictures-- in one of our rooms in the house in new york city upside down and it took two days for my father to

notice. but she waited and finally she said "darling, i think we should go into the other room to have coffee after dinner." because he hadn't gone in. >> rose: oh. >> and then he was shocked and he said "peggy, what have you done? this is shocking beyond belief." >> rose: what affected your relationship with her? >> rose: what affect mid-relationship with her? >> what did you have to sort of -- what did you have to deal with? >> well, i had to deal with her bouts of depression and anger. you know, it wasn't easy for her to come into this family. it isn't easy for anyone to come into the rockefeller family. >> rose: now, why is that? >> because there are great expectations and as my mother said you will get double praise and double blame. and so you -- it's true. and she wanted to be a leveler. she wanted to connect with all kinds of people, the farm manager and the butler.

same as my father, by the way, just as much as any prime minister. >> rose: you helped her through her depression. >> i like to think th i did. she called me a comfort and i was always there as best as i could be to help cheer her up. >> rose: in this book you say you werer as much eileen as you are a rockefeller. what do you want us to understand by that? that you are a human being whose name is eileen and that's as important as the fact that you're a human being whose name is rock feller? >> absolutely. the key here is we all come from some family or other and we all have the task of becoming ourselves. >> rose: what would you change about the life you have lived? >> rose: -- >> wow, what a great question. i think only thing i would change would be to have found more ways to be together as a

family growing up. but, you know, the great gift of my father's lon jeff city that what he was unable to -- the me he was unable to spend back then he's made up for spades since he retired from the chase manhattan bank. >> rose: including to the children and great grandchildren. ey go on trips together all around the world. >> they all do. >> rose: he's now 98 and just got back from somewhere? >> from paris and london, yes. >> rose: just showing the great grand kids -- is it great grand kids? >> he now has 12 great grandchildren. >> rose: showing them the world he knows because wherever he travel there is's an instant sense of "mr. rockefeller's herr" >> it's showing them the world and imprinting upon them the value and importance of family. >> you have something that people know about which is called empathy which is also a part of emotional intelligence. >> yes. >> rose: where did that come from? >> i think that came from trying to read my mother's moods and

help her. >> rose: so by empathizing with her then you saw that it had consequence? >> yes, it had positive consequence and it influence mid-interest in emotional intelligence which later led me to co-found the collaborative for economic and social and emotional learning with daniel goldman and about six others. >> rose: it's having its own success. >> it is. it's wonderful. well, he is, but socal and emotional learning when put in schools and programs has now been proven to increase children's academic aptitude by 11%. their grades. so the gruel family fund is what? >> we've concerned with climate change and we've chosen coal as the area to stop as much as possible then -- >> rose: have you talked to senator rockefeller about that? >> well, yes. but i tell you, mayor bloomberg really heard the story because

our $150,000 grant to sierra club in 2007 which started the whole campaign against new coal fired power plants has ended up with his giving $50 million to sierra club for the same project and it was because we insisted on a business plan. >> rose: that shows you seed community do a lot. >> exactly. so that's something paul -- we don't have huge resources, nothing like my father, but it's therefore more important that we look for root causes and act strategically. >> rose: "being a rockefeller, becoming myself." i lean rockefeller. thank you. >> rose: thank you very much, charlie. that was pleasure. >> thank you for joining us. see you next time.

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