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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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" 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. "

Robert Harris

Time

History

Light

" My greatest regret as a writer is that I've never been able to include as many jokes as I'd like. "

" My parents were interested in history and the world. My father read Graham Greene and Georges Simenon and was a strong trade unionist and Labour supporter. "

" For me, as I suspect for most people, there comes a point where you have enough. If you've got £20 million, why keep going until you've got £100 million or £1,000 million? Does anyone need another vast yacht or private jet or a house full of gold? "

Robert Harris

You

People

" You know, you can be really quite subversive in popular fiction, which is capable of taking on big issues of politics, war, the rise and fall of commercial dynasties. "

" In a way I'm almost more rueful about the notion of having a non-ideological Labour party than I am about the personality of Tony Blair. "

Robert Harris

I Am

Personality

" 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. "

" I can't get very excited about the House of Commons these days because I don't feel the power is there. What is really bizarre is that you sense it is not in Washington either. It is now very hard even to locate the levers of power, let alone to pull them and change things. "

" If you go back, 'The Great Gatsby' would be a portrait of the rich and fortune made by business. "

Robert Harris

Great

Rich

" Orwell has always been a huge influence on me. "

" I see myself as the literary equivalent of a skilled lathe-operator, or a basket-weaver; a potter, maybe: I make mildly diverting objects that people want to buy. "

" It's when you've stopped writing and are doing other things, especially when you're asleep, that the real work is done. "

" Writers and journalists tend to be simplistic about politics when, like all other areas of life, it's more complicated. "

Robert Harris

Politics

Complicated

" You find out what you think by talking to yourself. "

" Writing a novel - unlike operating a piece of heavy machinery, say, or cooking a chicken - is not a skill that can be taught. There is no standard way of doing it, just as there is no means of telling, while you're doing it, whether you're doing it well or badly. And merely because you've done it well once doesn't mean you can do it well again. "

" First comes an idea. Then, characters begin to evolve out of the landscape of that idea. And then, finally, characters dominate: plot is simply a function of what these people might do or be. Everything has to flow from their personalities; otherwise it will not be emotionally engaging, or plausible. "

" Writers of fiction should stick to writing, not pop up on panel shows or as a talking head. "

Robert Harris

Pop

Stick

" It's easy enough to get into power. You can make promises and try to be all things to all people. But the moment you have to make decisions, you're going to annoy at least half of them. Whatever you do, in the end you're almost certain to be brought down by your own character traits. "

" There's nothing more interesting than the details of someone's life. "

" 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. "

" History is what we bring to it, not just the events themselves, but how we interpret those events. "

" Humans have changed little over time. We think we've invented the modern world but they were making better speeches 2,000 years ago and grappling with issues of empire and terrorism. "

" My literary career was a fluke. Utterly unexpected. "

" Everyone thinks politics will just go on the way it is. I don't agree. "

Robert Harris

Everyone

Agree

" The financial markets tend to be just a backdrop for a novel, for a heist or something that isn't necessarily integral to it. On the whole, I don't think the financial world has been well served by novels. "

" 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. "

" One cannot see any world leader who has got a grip on the financial markets these days. They're too big, too fast. I think that's quite scary. "

" Politics is never a victory, it's just the remorseless grinding forward of events. "

" I used to love politics. I can't say I do any more. All the fun has gone out of it. Each side is engaged in this trench warfare of managerialism. They're all too scared to say anything that might make them appear something other than completely bland. "

" I think that whenever a nation feels itself to be at is zenith, it starts to feel a creeping sense of anxiety. "