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
history looking maybe mountains moved pattern perspective range seems time tries
If one tries to think about history, it seems to me - it's like looking at a range of mountains. And the first time you see them, they look one way. But then time changes, the pattern of light shifts. Maybe you've moved slightly, your perspective has changed. The mountains are the same, but they look very different.
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One gains a double benefit in writing about the past, conjuring up how things might have been, and at the same time acquiring a different perspective on the present.
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My father left school at 14, my mother at 13. My father was clever and well-read. He took a newspaper, always watched the news, discussed it all the time.
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I think it's great for them to come out and give their time and give some support and some acknowledgement to the Marine Corps and the base. I think it's awesome.
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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.
emotion emotions family people swayed sympathy
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.
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Black poverty has persisted and become intractable but unless we have some crisis like this, we basically forget about these people -- out of sight, out of mind.
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I think a lot of us feel, when we look at the Dow Jones plunging, alienated - you do feel as if we're in the grip of some alien force that slipped human control.
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Cut your manuscript ruthlessly but never throw anything away: it's amazing how often a discarded scene or description, which wouldn't fit in one place, will work perfectly later.
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I am sure future historians will say the biggest and most astonishing change in politics has been the embracing of all the tenets of Thatcherism by the party of Keir Hardie: trade union legislation, Europe, the replacement of Trident, 10 per cent tax for people who have made millions from their companies.
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Writers and journalists tend to be simplistic about politics when, like all other areas of life, it's more complicated.
We say, 'The market plummets,' like it's some roaring creature.
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To tell a good story and to illuminate the world: the two things are completely linked. That is the point. That is what I've always wanted to do.