Robert Harris
Robert Harris
British author, journalist, and BBC reporter who became known for his best-selling historical novel, Fatherland. The work is a thriller set during World War II.
NationalityBritish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth7 March 1957
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Social mores change all the time. In the mid-1970s, it would've been astonishing, say, to see two men holding hands in the streets. And the attitude to having a fling with a girl, or whatever, was quite different then.
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Having the urge to write a novel, especially if you've yet to be published, is like having a medical condition impossible to mention in polite company - it's a relief simply to know there are fellow-sufferers out there.
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Cicero most reminds me of Harold Wilson. Both men knew how to keep the show on the road.
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You can always spot a fool, for he is a man who will tell you he knows who is going to win an election.
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Power brings a man many luxuries, but a clean pair of hands is seldom among them.
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Does a name stick because it suits a man or does the man, unconsciously, evolve into his name?
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That young man seeks opportunities to test his principles as readily as a drunk picks fights in a bar.
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It is perseverance, and not genius that takes a man to the top. Rome is full of unrecognized geniuses. Only perseverance enables you to move forward in the world.
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The natural impulse of men is to follow and whoever has the strongest sense of purpose will always dominate.
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Politics? Boring? Politics is history on the wing! What other sphere of human activity calls forth all that is most noble in men's souls, and all that is most base? Or has such excitement? Or more vividly exposes our strengths and weaknesses? Boring? You might as well say that life itself is boring!
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I like to take people you wouldn't really think people would write novels about: an aqueduct engineer, a code-breaker, a hedge-fund manager. It's in those sorts of lives that I find more fascination than in a CIA operative or a Marine or something like that.
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It was a minor injury. He was running when it happened. We took him to hospital in South Africa because we just wanted to make sure he was okay, and that done, he is now back to work.
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Those two people were swayed more by sympathy and emotion for the family than anything objective. That's my feeling.
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Within reason, I can write what I like and spend as long doing it as is necessary. That is a luxury beyond price.