tolstoy would be a huge case in point. of course, he had the good, artistic grace and sense to wait until the end of one piece before of these before explicitly setting up a theory of history, which had been tacitly and subtly demonstrated by the preceding thousand pages of fiction. it requires very little thought to come up with examples of novelists using a character to give a straightforward lecture or in the case of a lecture on the painting of the dead christ. i think you have a copy of that incredible picture. it was in 1867 that the painting was first seen. his wife recalls how he stood for 20 minutes before the picture without moving. i often notice during the first moments of his epileptic fit. he could never forget and station that he had experienced in the museum in 1857. the figure of christ taken from the cross whose body party showed signs of decomposition haunted him like a horrible nightmare. and he comes back as painting and the idiot. he explains why some people may lose their faith by looking at that pic

tolstoy, he was the ultimate hedgehog. faust was i had charred. remember, i made a joke yesterday about when i wrote the novel about toast -- tolstoy a. please stop writing books about me? it seemed like a terrible joke. she was damned serious. i realized my mother is a wonderful tayra. ninety-seven, it's still going strong. she's amazing. realize certainly i learned. and when i broke my imagine my mother talking. also, the pursuit of the big white whale billing after the hedgehog. in a sense i feel like in all my books : doing is being this little fox and endlessly trying to figure out how the folks they do that. >> watcher mother going to think of this jesus book? [laughter] >> mary mary quite contrary. i don't think i'm being facetious when i say that found the discussion in a fascinating way by talking about the difference between the distinction between writing a fictionalized biography said he do and the supposedly non fictional biography that we write. i have become fascinated by this because the more i spend time writing biography and thin

characters so we can have dialogue but not lectures pasted and tolstoy would be a huge case in point* but to have the good grace and sense a the end of "war and peace" before setting off on history fed is tacitly demonstrated by the proceeding but it requires very little thought to come up with examples of novelist either do give a straight for the lecture when we give a lecture, it is just painted in on the dead christ and we have the incredible picture. this was in 1867 that the first saw this painting and he stood for 20 minutes without moving on the agitated face there was an expression during the first moment of an epileptic fit and he could never forget that sensation from the museum of 1867 christ taken from across whose body already showed signs of the composition haunted him like a horrible nightmare. and then he comes back to the painting in the idiot and exclaims why some people may lose their faith by looking at that picture and that includes all whole lecture on the painting. i have -- the lights of the eyes of the glint the looking to the dead body of a tortured man one

maybe a one hour or two hour us every day like you know delete like leo tolstoy maybe maybe think you. knew that you know as people do some g.s.t. for a two hour says every day or a joking when my game into the culture going is to write one or two hours every day about what i leave what i thought what i saw all the meditation i had on the day and i try to put all these which is my day and to put it in the very very small square of my notes i says this. every day you see tonight i would write about our meeting that in the end you listen what do you like most about your journeys well you mention challenges of the challenge is it the people you meet or maybe something else. i think the most important thing for me when i am writing bicycle around the world or crossings the state of scientology by horses or climbing the human i am looking for is to train to make the life be very intense. very deep and also i may obsession is to try. to make the time a little bit going a little bit slower slower because i am very obsessed by the. extremely fast ness of the time which is really. saying stray

this direction of modest steps that we have to advertise our culture not all the dostoyevsky and tolstoy but contemporary culture which is going to why but we can advertise for you know brain power which is lear and there are not many people aboard who believe that has any brain power so there are things that can be done and thing that should be done off course and to requires flexibility. resources requires international cooperation and sometimes i think we've seen police make you know very very very sort of bloggers trying to be you know a very straightforward quote unquote southern russia and that doesn't work you know you need to be professional of this field like many others but who is going to listen to that in the west they don't want to hear that that's no reason i think that there's some sort of there are stereotypes but you. take for example the issue of you know germany after the second world war which had a very bad image in the united states and in the rest of europe japan you know there are countries. you know these are not exactly the best record our current how we were ab

on par with periclean athens or the italy of the medicis or elizabethan england or the russia of tolstoy and dostoevsky. america did not belong on that list because of its achievements in the arts. it belong there because by remaining loyal to the principles of -- a firm declaration of independence it had developed into a country in which there was more liberty and more prosperity, more widely shared than in any other nation in the history of the world. if whitaker chambers had lived to hear it he would have been shocked by that statement. he most certainly did not heartache of the anti-americanism of the left but there was a bitter critic of america on the right in which he did critique. this critique goes back to the earliest days of the republic and focuses on what is mentioned several times already, the alleged materialism of american life, the putative crassness of its culture and supposedly philistines indifference or hostility to things of the spirit, all of which seem to flow from what even coke will called quote max the exclusively commercial habits he claimed were brittany amer

par with pinnacle in athens or the elite of the medicis or other cities in england, was a rush of tolstoynlike them, america did not belong on that list because of its achievements in the arts. it belonged there because my remaining on the whole, loyal to the principles of firm and the declaration of independence, it had developed into a country in which there was more liberty and more prosperity, more widely shared than any other nation in the history of the world. if whittaker chambers had lived to hear it, he probably would have been shocked by that statement. he most certainly did not partake to the anti-americanism of the left. but there was also bitter critique of america on the right, in which he most certainly did partake. this critique goes all the way back to the earliest days of the republic, and it focuses on what has been mentioned several times already, the alleged materialism of american life, the crassness of its culture and its supposedly indifference or hostility to things with the spirit. all of which was seem to flow from what tocqueville, even tocqueville called both

do you think he wants to argue about whether tolstoy can walk when he is dying or sing when he walking. >> two years ago and that guy is an idiot. >> they can't all be idiots. you argue with everybody. you have one of the worse reputations in this town, michael. nobody will hire you. >> are you saying that nobody in new york will work with me? >> no, that's too limiting. nobody in hollywood wants to work with you either. i can't even sign you up for a commercial am you played a tomato for 30 seconds they went half a day over schedule because you wouldn't sit down. >> it wasn't logical. >> you were a tomato. a tomato doesn't have logic it can't move. >> that's what i said so if he can't move how is he going to sit down, gorge, i was a stand up tomato, a juicy sexy beef steak tomato. nobody does vegetables like me. i did an evening of vegetables off broadway, the best tomato, best you could cumber i did an endive salad. >> every acker that saw that movie understood the substance of what that scene was really about. if you don't, if a tomato doesn't have legs then you have to figure out a