Gavin Esler In Conversation with Bernard Cornwell

hello my name is Laura Thomas Walters and I'm studying a PhD in conservation welcome to the University of Kent thank you for buying a ticket to tonight's event money from the sale of every ticket goes to as a Kent Opportunity Fund this provides hardship bursaries and funding and support for student ed projects in addition I am one of the scholars supported by the fund I'm working on social marketing and behavioral change demand reduction in the wildlife trade without your support I would not have been able to start my PhD this year missing out on vital opportunities to collaborate with researchers from the University of Oxford and London see so on my behalf and the behalf of ever Kent students thank you it gives me great pleasure to welcome the stage our Chancellor Gavin Ezra and his special guest Bernard Cornwell OBE well hello good evening and welcome to in conversations thank you very much for being here and making these this series such a success our guest tonight is famous around the world as simply one of the best historical novelist anywhere selling more than last time I looked it was 30 million books but it's probably more than that now he's better known to me as an old friend he was my first boss at BBC in the BBC Northern Ireland and in my my anecdote egde I was trying to remember what I could say about him that would be most scurrilous but I won't say that um but I do remember he was a man of infinite wisdom and advice and I remember one one evening we were drinking in an illegal Club in West Belfast called the White Rock social club which was run by well we were told by community leaders but it seems to be the IRS far like I said and after a couple of pints of Guinness I was foolishly engaged in an arm wrestling contest with various people and it was a knockout contest Bernard at one point came up to me put his arm round me and said you're going to lose the next one and I said I don't think so he's quite a little fella and he said no no you're gonna lose the next one and I said why am I gonna lose the next one he said because it's the West Belfast IRA commander and I really think we'd like to be able to leave so please will you welcome burner Cornwall now the quit the lot of questions have come in on Twitter and email and so on but the one question that a lot of people have asked is how did you become a historical novelist was a spunk is despair I mean I um you're with me and a blonde walked out of a lift in Edinburgh you remember I I didn't I said I'm gonna marry that one and she was American pacifist yoga teacher vegetarian and what a cut a long story short I did but she couldn't live in Britain for all sorts of perfectly good reasons and I could go to to to the States I mean I was insane I never had a wish in my life to go and live in America right and but you know true love and so I ended up in New Jersey and I couldn't get a work permit and I said don't worry darling I'll write a book there is a total insanity so I wrote a book I made another one and another one another one yeah and I was an illegal immigrant for I think about three years and it's too late you can't shot me because I'm a citizen um and I'd now you know I'm 72 I've lived in America literally half my life and it's all her fault I have to say it was actually love at first sight it was absolutely something like first sight honestly lust at first sight works I don't know if you can have love at first sight unless it's a puppy um but I fancied her something wrong you did and we're still married it worked they did it did it did work but you but I also I moved into burners flat when he when he left Belfast and he left he left a number of things he left a bill from milk was one of the things he left but he left a huge number of books including more books on I think the flintlock musket than I thought ever existed was I want those books you bought it but but it was the television still there I can't remember when I moved in um my land was a lovely man could Lee and he says anything you want Vernon and I I said look we're great you know we need this that and the other and I said that but I do need a television because I work in television the BBC very kindly gave you a television but my then ex-wife took that in the divorce settlement and so I was going to go down I said I'm gonna go down to Granada and rent one is it honor you don't need to do that he said he said well Senate television would you like and fast behind I work in it Liam I need a color television Zack I'll get you one he said but you're not too worried where it comes from are you new I don't know no no I and he said it'll be cheap I promised it would be a good one sir I'm and I waited and waited to find about two weeks later this bloody television is huge it's the biggest television you've ever seen and he brings it up with his son and they stagger into the flat with it and he's his where'd you want it and and so he puts it I said how much do I owe you said oh you don't owe me a thing he says it doesn't work but I didn't want anyone to think you couldn't afford a television and I had to leave this television there is huge non-working television in the corner apartment you know because Liam had given it to me and he'd be hurt like crazy so I didn't give that to you no I don't think so I think one of the secrets of success in television is not actually to watch it I suspect that might that might help let's talk a bit about books and I can't believe you're Chancellor well I can't believe it I think the winning chance appears in it he'll at 22 23 when I mentioned I was yes wearing bad suits yes he did tell me off for wearing bad suits in in Belfast can you believe it and I remember saying to him but look at you you're wearing denim for goodness sake even were denim jacket and a shady pair of denim trousers and he turned to me said I think you'll find I'm not on television you are let's talk about the books um you once said to me and more you books bear this out you have a foreground and a background you have a front story of the back story and you said Gone with the Wind you know civil war and then the burning of the house and your shop is exactly like that yes yeah and in most historical novels you know the big story is who will win the Civil War the little story is can scarlet save Terre and you flipped them he put a little story on the front from the big story behind that uh that's it you know how know how to do it well that cuts out about five of the question that came in it came in it came in and Twitter but the Napoleonic Wars I mean that was a fascination of viewers from childhood Hornblower yeah yeah I mean it ran off home blur and I can remember but you know when I was a teenager reading Hornblower and then there was the only wrote eleven I'm told that Forester actually didn't in he wrote in America he was in California and I told he didn't actually much like writing home blur and wherever little brown when their profits were sort of bit shaky shaky they would dispatch someone with a case full of whiskey bottles to persuade him to write another one but he only wrote eleven and I remember sort of getting off the end and reading the last one and then what what's left to read well he went to the sort of nonfiction histories and through that I discovered Wellington and the Peninsular war and I thought well these are amazing stories and I kept haunting workshops looking for home Blair on land until a little light went on in my head and said well why don't you write them I actually tried in Belfast and failed and I have an enormous admiration for people who hold down a job and managed to write a book at the same time and many of those people are you know what we would now call home makers and how these women managed to run a home raise kids do the laundry do the shopping do the cooking and they still find time to write a terrific book but I you know I I couldn't do the two together I actually had to become unemployed but you how did you plan it I mean did you plan from the beginning to now because I began I mean I began with in 1809 and then I wrote ten books and I wrote sharps Waterloo which thank God was a number-one bestseller and I'll tell you why I mean not just it was nice but to have it as number one but that's when Sean Bean came along to make the TV series he only got the part because he looks like me man um you know mrs. Cornwall didn't actually breed any idiots and I realized that what was needed was more sharp books because we've got Sean all over the screen but the trouble is I already finished the series not much happens after 1815 so I had to go back and write a second series which began in 1799 and the tour not I'd like to said they're dovetail together well they're not they're sort of in jam together and lots of things that are said in the first ten books don't actually happen in the second series when I came to write them when all the women have to die yeah you know you can't need a woman to fall in love and shops Trafalgar if she's not in sharps whatever it is just the next one so the pub you know I hate it I love that woman back there's another one gone right I know they weren't planned at all if I'd planned it there'd be a hell of a lot better the gene the genius of the book seems to me partly that you have a cast of characters which also saves you creating new characters unless you bump them off as you do with the women fairly really quickly that that and also sharp and the class that he comes from and the aspirational part of that or somebody said yeah well it seemed obvious that he should come out from the ranks and I mean I got very annoyed in a couple of years ago driving listening to Radio 4 and there's some professor something not I'm pleased to say from University of Kent saying you know that all Britain's officers in the Napoleonic Wars were you know stuck-up upper-class idiots they weren't by Waterloo about a quarter of the officers were up from the ranks Wellington didn't actually approve of that very much he said they always take to drink which may well have been true but there were a lot who came out from I was really stuck but switching gears just for a second Waterloo you're only I think known for yeah the only one which it is if you haven't read it it's terrific I mean I didn't hear that H Turner it is terrific I don't get a cut of course but he might pay bloody milk bill from 90 °f from Belfast how much was it it was about two pounds fifty [Applause] actually given the exchange rate could you pay in dollars ladies and gentlemen two pounds yes you've come again anyway I was about to pay a great compliment which is look at me apart from the fact it's a page-turner there's bits in Waterloo which I simply didn't know and that was one of them in other words you have you have for instance at one point one of the enlisted men saying we've got two kinds of officers that come on lads and the go on lads and we're the kind of regiment that wants to come on lads in other words the officers have to be part of the unit I thought that was really striking and as the whole survived background my favorite story in it there was before Waterloo and Wellington was the British ambassador in Paris which was not the most tactful appointment the government has ever made and he goes to a levia reception and there are a number of Napoleon's i-x officers there and they turn their backs on him very deliberately and a French woman is offended by the lack of courtesy and apologizes to the Duke and he said do not worry madam I have seen their backs before me let's talk a bit about your latest series the Saxon stories and so on and the foundation I suppose the founding stories of England yeah tell us about that the spark that created those well I've always I've always loved the anglo-saxons now I've always thought it's really weird that we don't that we the English don't know where England comes from you know if you're live in America you know it's July the 4th 1776 and blah blah blah you know lots of countries have their foundation myths we don't have one and we think has always been in England but if you being born if you were living in the end of the 9th century the word England the name England would have meant very little if anything at all and yet within 50 years it means a lot suddenly by by say the Year 937 you have one country under one king now is going to go through all sorts of vicissitudes but it will never again before countries are seven countries it'll be one country and that process is the making of England now that's the big story and it's quite an exciting story you know you you have you got Vikings roaming all over here and you know Farnham in Surrey there's a battle you know you don't have battles in farm you know it's a nice piece um it is an extraordinary story but it's not the story I wanted you know I'm still looking for the little story and when I was 58 years old which is what led oh but but 14 years ago I met my real father for the first time and his surname was out Trudeau ugh tre Jean he lived in British Columbia but he'd been a Royal Canadian Air Force officer over here during the war and he'd had a naughty with Dorothy Cornwall and but I'd never met either of them like a knight your your biological mother or father I didn't neither and so I meet William first and he's charming lovely we get on very very well and he said oh I got this family tree I knew the family came from Yorkshire and the family tree goes all the way back to I did the flame bearer who was you know this Saxon bastard in the 6th century who slaughters the ancient Britons or whatever the Britons and it turned out that that there were lots of people who trade in this sutured goes to out read quite easily I thought that's it I don't know just curiously Judy and I had been on vacation to Northumberland and we'd stayed at Bamburgh and we'd absolutely I had no idea that I had a connection with I just thought this castle is sick this little tiny village was wonderful we loved it so much we went back again the following year and just been you know the week's knocking around Northumbria and then I found out that if we'd actually owned the caste or will be down the fortress and then about I don't know eight years ago we visited again and this time the present owner lovely man was there when I said look you know we had we own this place and in ten sixteen it was stolen from us by Earl Godwin who ambushed then who tried and murdered him and I said you know this is ours and it was stole if you have a shred of decency a shred you would give it back he said let me bring you the heating bills step aside so I said yes you can keep it so you heard you big story and your small story you're the big stories of making a ring with little story is can you Trina get back bebbanburg which is now Bamburgh Castle so that you know that was fast the spark and the spark is finding that in fact I had these ancestors who what was what was it like meeting your biological father for the first time um it was in time in it was it is in a sense it happened by accident I I knew I knew his name I'd already had always known his name and I'll know if I had his Royal Canadian Air Force nothing but doesn't matter how I knew it I just did and I knew my mother's name and I was in Vancouver being interviewed by The Vancouver Sun and it was plain that the reporter had been told by you know his editor going interview this guy and he was bored to death he didn't know who the hell I was he cared even less and he was plain and I didn't blame it you know I mean you know you've been in that position to where you know you're doing a story I think what the hell am i doing this story I got a key I'll wake you up cuz he said well you know what are you looking forward to seeing in Vancouver and I said my real father and that woke him up and so and it was a slip and as that and I didn't give him his full name I just gave him the surname and I'd actually looked in the telephone book and seen there are quite a lot of outrage there I just left at that and the two nights later we were giving a talk in Toronto and a young woman came up to me and said I'm related to you and this she said taking out a piece of paper is your father's address so her hey why not so I wrote to him and then we met he died I think four or five years ago but we had a lot we we had a good time and his the first time I'd ever been with someone who's related to me hmm and it was he snorts when he loves what he did you know and like my half brothers I found had two half brothers and a half sister and God knows what else and he was pleased to see you yes he was must be shocked I presume well he knew I existed hmm but he'd never told anybody and this is in 58 years he'd never told anybody that he'd you know dropped one in England during the war but no we liked and as Judy said to me after the first village said if you don't want that family I do they're lovely literally so it was great we got on we've got on fine and it's sparked off a series it sparked off the books yeah absolutely it's that's very interesting isn't it where because again there's a number of questions that have come in and Twitter but basically about where do you get your inspiration from I used to say the mortgage the man you thought he used to or pure accident or chance or something look I can't think of doing anything in the world this isn't well I can I was about to say as much fun as writing books other than a few things um and I get paid for telling stories it's wonderful and I don't know if I even believe in inspiration um you start a book you create a world and you hope out of that world that a story emerges um I honestly don't know I mean I suppose yeah meeting William was an inspiration in the sense that I sound like that aha that's my story you know um but I don't know but it is I I mean this is hardly telling secrets it is work I mean for you it is absolutely what you but is it you still do 9:00 to 5:00 don't god no I do five to six I mean I usually I'm usually worked by 5:00 a.m. in the morning I mean I'm saying I mean five o'clock in the morning I'm you know maybe looking at the BBC website see what's happened in the world and then in despair you turn to the know I slept on it and then a seven o'clock I walk with dog you know and then the wretched dog every afternoon wants to have a ball thrown as a tyrant I never thought my declining years I would spend as a toilet monitor for a small dog but that is so um and you know I mean really honestly you don't spend the whole time writing at me some of the time you're staring into space or you're you know watching Tom Brady on YouTube yeah but you writer's block is not something from we should suffer look the day that a nurse can phone up I know any Hospital you like to mention all right I say city hospital in Belfast and she says I can't come to work today I've got nurses block and is it all you mustn't darling no you know you stay home until it's over I mean you poor thing you poor wee thing you can't you mustn't come in today I mean her job is far more difficult than my job what right have I got to say I can't do it today I'm it's pathetic but do you the only way you can justify writer's block is if it is your very first or maybe second book and you do not know if what you're doing will ever see the light of day you have no confidence in what you're doing um I'm not sure that that's a block that is simply a huge hurdle that you have to get across and maybe if you're writing you know deeply serious literature but no I mean what I do is not know know when a nurse can be told stay at home and we'll pay you dear because you've got nurses block I'll believe in writer's block until that day it doesn't exist but you turn up every day and sit in front of the screen and get on with it yeah yes there isn't another way hmm I mean even if it the work you do that day isn't particularly great at least you know not to use that I mean you know you hey look some writers you know famously Joanna Rowling plots everything up from the beginning so when she starts to write it you know she knows what Harry will be doing in this chapter right through to the last chapter which is great if you can do it and I can't I I always think it's rather like climbing a mountain I get a better quarter of the way up and I look back and I think oh that's a better route so you go back and you start the book again and that better route propels you a third of the way up when you look back and say ah god I should have done that way and I think it was eel dr. o who said that writing a novel is like driving down an unfamiliar country road night and you can only see as far ahead as your rather feeble headlamps will show and that I mean genuinely when I wrote not the last one the one before us I got to the last chapter and I still didn't know how it was going to end but then that's why that's one of the reasons it works because he ever wanted to I mean it doesn't you know oh yeah and what was it that um Somerset Maugham said there are three rules for writing a novel unfortunately no one knows what they are so you know I mean for some people the rule is you know what your English teacher tells you plan your work but for me it is not it this seems like an appropriate moment to to also discuss your role as Susannah Kells would you like to tell people what static else oh she's dead poor thing sad this is Susannah cows well no I should my wife is is Anna kettles oh I can hear her protesting I once wrote phrase fish and I said what's the next word and I said chips I said great you just wrote something here that was it this was publishing politics and I was writing for HarperCollins as they were then I think William Collins they hadn't become HarperCollins and they wouldn't publish two of my books a year they said nobody wants to read two books a year by the same author so I had to write a book for another publisher which no one would suspect was me then Harper Kahn I said whammy publishing that has a font so I spoke to her and killed her off yep there's a joke somewhere there but I can't remember the yes you cut her a red eye I think this is the point where we should raise the lights and throw open to some questions from the audience if we may is there still anybody there oh yes thank goodness for that we have got some microphones which will speak towards you so who would like to be first yes out of the sharp books which um I will the characters that died which one would you bring back if you had over died Hakes well without any doubt who's the best villain I ever had I mean I loved over two Hicksville um I'm like an idiot I killed him off but I have a suspicion he might have had a twin brother called Jedediah and and is almost stupid things I ever did was killing off a bird I was a good villain walking he was totally based on me says so in the scriptures some more thought yes well I yes it is deliberate um I mean I don't want that makes it more interesting but I mean if you're riding a sharp book his enemies are not the French surprisingly his enemies are almost always on his own side and the reason for that is if his enemy is French he never spends any time with them with the map right you know because on the other side I mean obviously you can have the old one like Pierre do Co but but on the whole his enemies are on his own side for Nate Starbuck I just thought it makes his life a lot more interesting if he actually knows he's fighting for the wrong side which he does but by that time his ties of loyalty to his own tip to the Confederacy are so strong that he can't pull it out so I mean it gives him I don't want to say it gives him a moral dilemma but that's what it does and I don't know I mean uh 'tried I love ultra and you know by making him into a pagan because I just know it is gonna so piss off the Christian Sachs I like that the best joke I have written is in the new book the flame bear and I ain't gonna tell you what it is but I a friend of mine was reading it last a week ago and he suddenly laughed out loud and I said I know what you just read and he had that's called a sales pitch it's very good one the lady up there with real people really fast and putting in things which example both let's become complacent with Alford's jaw to the land of Mercia that's really interesting but how did you all hear the question okay good well I think you I do owe a debt to history so you know much as they disbelieve it the French cannot win Waterloo although they actually think they did nowadays it really depends on what I'm writing and what I'm writing for I wrote two books about the American Revolution and I am now invading the high ground of American myth you cannot make it up you can make up conversations but the second book is called the fort and it's a very strongly about Paul Revere and I mean every American knows who Paul Revere is and I don't expect all of you to know but he is the one of the most famous heroes the American Revolution about him Longfellow wrote a famous poem listen my children and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere well they do hear that they hear it from their primary school onwards and there's a little glorious equestrian statue in Boston but the truth is is that Paul Revere fought the British once and at the end of it he was caught marshaled for cowardice and incompetence and they don't know that so when I wrote that story I have to be very careful I mean I knew that I had heard things research things about Paul Revere which I'm not in the book because I couldn't find a second source if you're writing about Oh trivia now I don't care as much mean one there are no ghost alive people don't care I mean no one's really gonna get upset if I make up a fact I mean if he has a mad passionate love affair with Ethel Slade why not when I think it's very unlikely that she had a wild love affair with anybody she had one daughter and then if you have any more children where you draw your own conclusion but that doesn't make her a terribly interesting character um also because the further back in history you go the less we know about things and I wrote a books about Arthur which I love the through the winter king enemy of garden Excalibur I love those three books I don't you know we know almost nothing about that period uh I mean I that's where you get into trouble because I would get letters after was this before email and I I mean I have I still keep these files they're stuffed with letters and they're all much the same letter they start off like this dear mr. Corman I have just read your book the winter King and I have to say that you have got Guinevere all wrong I was Guinevere in a previous existence and you can't argue with that and I think I had 17 people claiming to being win over in a previous existence a lot of being Gawain Sam had been Lancelot okay um it's going to be here tonight sure this yes sir you while you're looking well on it if I may say like sloth Ott's yes is gentleman down here anybody over this side come to yep a couple of years autopsy my mind goes to John Fraser when I think about some history and you know cleave someone within the center of a historical situation and I just wanted what do you think about those novels oh I love if you haven't read flash man read him I mean flash one is genius I mean I'm sure most of you know who flash moon isn't I mean I adore George I mean flash moon is a complete total absolute rogue who goes through the early 19th century and of course he was entirely made up George was I think an assistant editor on a Scottish newspaper and didn't get the editors job and was very unhappy about that I can't really I rememba said to his wife I'm gonna write our way out of this which he did and he makes up his complete rogue flash Minh who is you know your daughter let alone your wife is not safe anywhere close to flash when Harry flash Minh who was from the Tom Browns school did books I mean flash Minh is the bully in Tom Browns school days and George had the brilliant idea of telling the story of the rest of his life he's an absolute rogue and I I knew George quite well and loved the man and he said to me one day he said he said the trouble is he says that um he says people come up to me and they say my grandmother knew flash when he took up the bed I tell them whose fictional they won't believe me and you know I mean and George's are worried about that because at the books at one of the conceit to the book is that they're all written from the flash and then papers that were discovered in an attic sort of in 1950 all right I mean you know flash and who's wonderful when he gets the VC for an actor that's new cowardice is brilliant the rabbit George so there's a wonderful book if you haven't read it I it's now compulsory reading at West Point you know the American equivalent of Sandhurst and it's called quartered safe out here and it is George's story of his service in the Second World War when he was a private in the and I think the Dharan Light Infantry and fought against the Japanese in Burma it is quite brilliant so he wrote you know from from a lot of personal experience oh he was a great and wonderful man and I love the flash moon books love them yes there's somebody there and something that well you generally pleased with the casting of various characters in the sharp series and a second question if I may be so greedy did you have any power of veto on the production and now replay no um again all this difference I mean some people some authors like to be very very possessive of how their books are turned into television I'm not in the least bit possessive I take the view that I mean you take the new series the last Kingdom is being made by the people made Downton Abbey what the hell can I tell them about the television production the answer is nothing and any obstacle I put in their way is an obstacle why do that that's stupid you know for me I actually I loved I mean I mean Sean Bean made a terrific Sharpe and I don't you know people who complain saying well he's not black-haired I won't you know sorry as I said he only got it because you look like me but then Pete Postlethwaite as Obadiah Hakes well he was far better than my hoax well far better um and so what you know what my feeling is is that very often these people take your books they add their own creativity their own ideas it and it's incredibly valuable and and people say well that didn't happen in the books like you know tough you know you've got two versions it cost you nothing this one you know the one on television were apart from your license fee if you do pay it you know it I I loved them all and I don't you know there's there was one sharps gold I think I'd love to know what he was smoking when they made that um but it certainly wasn't legal but you know it's that others I mean Sean was terrific and he was all by accident he was originally another actor was playing sharp and they actually filmed for I think about three or four weeks and they were shooting in the Ukraine this was the first series and they had a day off and they were playing soccer football on the beach against the Ukrainian extra soup or from the Ukrainian army and this poor guy did something dreadful to his ankle or leg I mean really off and could not walk for six months and it's the biggest insurance claim in British television history and they had ten days to turn it round and the only actor who was available is one they hadn't auditioned because they didn't think he'd be any good mr. bean and mr. bean came along and they shot the first scene thought oh my god he is shot he was wonderful he was absolutely wonderful and I like Alexander Damon as sutured my door David Dawson is King Alfred so now I think they're great I mean it's um I really do and I don't want any control I don't want to have it I mean they said to me did I want to be a technical advisor the answer's no have you been on set I mean you know and at what just because it's interesting I haven't been to the last Kingdom one they said we would I want to go there this year and then they're finishing earlier than they thought so there's no time but I went to the shop Julie went to the shop said a lot and and a blister you know I'd worked 11 years in television and I know a lot of that television and the one thing I do know is I know nothing about producing television drama absolutely nothing you know I reasonably okay at doing television current affairs on how I was stuck with people like this and Jeremy Paxman we don't feature in his memoirs thing we don't they just came out we're not mentioned when we work with him fit was all he ever his boss and you were his colleague and we were there for over three years it's great isn't it I'm really pleased that's a result yeah yeah they're just wait to rewrite ours I know there was some of that yes gentlemen they um what period of history would you like to do next if you what period of history do I like the best whatever I'm writing about at the moment hmm if you're looking for something next to do next yeah I'm that there is one um I'm not sure I need should say it because I think it's bad luck ah um I don't know I love the faxes I'm obviously I love the sharp period very much the one I dislike intensely is the Victorians they just bore me to death and I mean some point after about 1830 there occurred what they call the evangelical revival and we all became respectable and incredibly dull and I mean so much of history is a war between Cavaliers and Puritans I mean obviously our civil war was and so in many ways was the American Revolution I mean the American Revolution is there Puritans and the Puritans always win is they don't stay up late at night getting drunk instead they sit there making plans and meanwhile you know my lot and people who want me to write about the Civil War I don't want a rover Civil War cat the wrong side win you know I'm not saying that I'm sure Parliament was right and you know that and Charles was an idiot but I have a King Charles Cavalier spaniel and I had only called Royalists and I liked to drink whiskey late at night I don't want to sit there reading the Bible making plans so I won't do that I don't I don't know I love the Saxons I mean it's a terrible time to be alive I wouldn't want to cook pack your you are a bit of a Hobbesian on you life is nasty brutish and short and many of your many of your works well I think life was nasty brutish and sure I mean obviously the sack sometimes it was terrible and I mean in the sharp period to you know life expectancy unless you was very short unless you were very privileged but I was thinking but I mean it's that said people still had an immense amount of enjoyment out of life I mean there was dancing there was singing there was you know that it's not all Monty Python dragging through the mud I mean but you do have mud I mean that was one of the things that struck me about the Arthurian stories was that people get involved in mud and dirt and disease and you know you don't shy away from that it's not it's not a bunch of men in tights basically which is what what how how its seen in the Hollywood version well I mean just think how awful those battles were I mean that the truth is is that England was not made to a peaceful series of politics it was made through fighting and they were dreadful battles I mean in egad often which is the Welsh part written in southern Scotland which is about the the well she settled in lowland Scotland making an attack on the Saxons in Yorkshire and they say we were drunk I mean yeah and the poem actually says you know and I don't think you could go I mean imagine what the horror of those battles you're facing people like Martin Johnson you know we think of the second row forge the English rugby team of the Welsh rugby team they love this stuff right you know they love getting stuck in but you don't all right and these horrors have got lead weighted axes and I can't wait to get at you I don't well have a drill on me go let me another one I mean you are killing at a range where you can smell your enemy's breath and if you don't your wives are gonna be taking your children I could be taking the slaves your home is gonna be burned when he's notice that this happened it happened again and again and again you your only choice is in fact to fight and if you fight and this is one things I like about Wellington were suddenly jumping you know a thousand years is that at the Battle of Waterloo he spent much of the battle saying to the men if we win we're gonna have peace and he believed that he actually am he said afterwards I pray for no more fighting he didn't like it he was good at it and like Napoleon who craved it and surely the point of war is peace and that's what Alfred wanted Alfred wanted a kingdom which he would call England which will be a Christian Kingdom which would be a kingdom of God on earth and the moment that a Dane converted he was no longer the enemy he was now Christian but you couldn't you couldn't just surrender and say you know I'm sorry we're Christians and we turn the other cheek and we're pacifists because that's the end of you because the other guys don't believe that the yeah is horrible absolutely horrible but they did have a limb they had need those gentlemen their partner to act as you already mentioned how well you think the last Kingdom my transition from book to story I think that how well do the last Kingdom make the transition from book to screen I think was brilliant and remember they have constraints that I don't have okay if a book is flagging in the center which it does sometimes I can wheel on 40,000 frogs and beat them up right and this would be they can't do that because they cost money it's more that they did eight one hour programs and in that they did two books which add up I think to about probably around two hundred and eighty thousand words probably and there are things that they just can't do so they have to actually they have to take some things out and I thought they did it brilliantly I mean I missed I wish they'd had stay put the character stateroom but I understood totally why they didn't and why they gave it to Leah Frick instead and actually that I thought that worked incredibly well I mean I do get letters saying oh we shouldn't have been live for it because it was de Pepe who cares you know I mean I I really think it worked well and I don't know I mean I I thought it it's almost impossible to translate one into the other exactly one because they as I said have constraints I don't have I thought they did a great job and and I like Alexander dreyman I mean I I know there were some students at University of Hartford were watching the first one this is a good friend of mine they had a whole lot of them watching and remember the scene where they throw the boy off the horse and he comes out in his birthday suit grown up as I said he only got that part because he looked like there's one at the top they're done more for transmitting historical knowledge to members of the public sorry so so you've possibly done more to raise awareness of historical periods than most historians before it's Paula microphone he said with apologies to historians in the audience I want to stress that I've always thought the historical novels are a gateway to history I mean if you you know if you read Jordan Donald Fraser you might well become really fascinated by whatever the Crimean War or the Afghan Wars and and what he's done is he's raised your interest in that and so yes I mean that's why I always think at the end of a book it's my job to say look this is what I've made up this this is the fictional bit and if you want to know more why don't you go and look at this book or this book or that book so yeah I hope so I mean at the same time I'm also sort of aware that probably a lot of very serious historians I didn't say despise I mean maybe they do that's tough you know I can't help that yeah I mean I would imagine that yeah I I'm not being modest here but I suspect a lot more people know a lot more about the Peninsular war because of Richard sharp and why not you know he's fun he gets to meet the Marchesa and Lady Greg's he pick slice off the Marchesa you don't get that in history but you so yeah and but but look that's what happened to me I learned about history originally through reading historical novels and you know I'm sure that all of us historical novelist get people interested in history because you think I want to know more about this I hope is gentleman there and then it's O'Keefe job will we ever see another one another sharp book yeah when I retire I'm gonna write a sharp no actually a serious I mean it's my it's my retirement project I try to carry tired 36 years ago but um yeah I actually left a gap in the series just for that and I actually love to write yeah yeah you'll get another one if I live long enough it and there's somebody over there yeah if you had to recommend one historical novel to be read what would it be doesn't have to be one of yours oh it does well let's not recommend one of mine um we've already talked about George MacDonald Fraser actually probably my favorite historical novel is Gore Vidal's Lincoln which I absolutely loved I mean I can understand whether if you're not interested in American history in which case I would go back and read flash them because I think flash one is just absolutely wonderful and yeah how does I do Americans react to you talk about sensitivities about American myths and the mythological Paul Revere as opposed to the real one but how did they react it at a Brit or former Brit writing about American history I mean is that they don't seem to mind I mean you get the odd idiot I mean I you know I wrote about Starbuck and I have been playing baseball and you get reviewers saying they didn't play baseball in 1861 Malik did but you know but but you thought there's nothing you can do about that I mean it is no Londyn writing and complaining but it is in the mind in the terms of the dialogue did you find that different easier what dialogue is always difficult in the way I mean do you write dialogue in a sort of studiedly arcane manner the answer is no I mean oh I did once get a very bitter letter about sharp books saying that my dialogue was altogether too modern and this is again was long before we had email and stuff and so rather evilly I wrote back to the guy and said well just tell me if this dialogue is too modern and he wrote back saying yes it is and I was able to write back to him saying those that dialogue came from Pride and Prejudice took me a long time to find him um but you know I mean obviously autre didn't speak where I have August you know he's over 30 laughs order Alfred de Kooning he spoke in a language that we don't even recognize and I mean in the sharp looks frankly and it I mean the word that sharp would have used most of all is the f-word the efficacious word but I decided not to use it so the maiden aunts would buy the book for their nephews which worked but if you're reading the sharp but you can add the words yourself but I mean that was the communist word in the in the British Army at that time still is still yes that's a couple more questions yes this gentleman up there raced read of historical fiction why do you think the anglo-saxon period seems to be largely neglected by historical fiction writers other than yourself I don't know the question is why why I have English writers ignored the anglo-saxon period it's partly because for some strange reason we decided that British history begins in 1066 or English history begins in 1066 which is obviously plainly doesn't only have so much history you just had to still have a cut-off date at some point I mean anything we know about you know when we leave school is it King Alfred was a terrible Baker and I mean that's about it and I don't know why I have no idea why and I just think it's it's a I suppose I think it is that cutoff date of 1066 which people just think this is this is when it begins and before that it's all dark edges mystery I can't think of another answer everybody else gentlemen the front row [Music] Tom Cruise yeah I can I don't even remember why regalo Steve now there's a proposal to make that into a TV program and they said well they wanted another book and would I write it and I actually want to I quite I like right Sandlin but I don't know is the answer I mean you know it's I get into enough trouble when you break off a series halfway through and people say why am too written more of this and I really think I need to take ultra through but I like Sam and list it there are other stand-alones I mean there's the the Holy Grail trilogy which has four books in it there that's an extra book and third an Asian core so there are a few Redcoat before or all stand-alones there a few standalone and now I'd like the gallows see if it was it's the only one of my heroes is actually a good guy instead of being a rogue but I like him I wouldn't mind doing another one final thought final question what is gonna be one for me then which is we haven't discussed your alternative career acting oh God little-known but go on explain because Sean Bean well you know obviously looks like you and you decided to do his job about it about ten years ago that's 11 years ago there's a little theater on Cape Cod called the Monomoy theater which is an interesting theatre it only operates in the some is what they call summer stock and the actors are all all are mostly students from all across America sometimes from Britain too but rarely who are studying drama studying theatre the theatre students I mean rather do musical theatre or straight theatre and it's a chance for them and they're very serious about it and many of them have gone on to a career in theater for them to do eight plays in ten weeks and the grown-up parts as we call them a play by equity actors when the directors rule equity and about 11 years ago there was a director from the National Theatre going there to direct henry v and his plane was delayed and the artistic directors have phoned me up and said would i go and give them a talk on the background to henry v so which I did now the any of you said you should be on stage and I said no not at all what can't think about it so the next year I played Duncan in Macbeth you know you're dead in six minutes you go to the park and that was 10 years ago this year I played Prospero that's the career trajectory is the career trajectory I think I've reached my Heights I can't wait to hear your Dame perhaps you're here now you're not Hamlet or you but in it in the meantime I have danced with you know people who are now professional dancers on Broadway I have that solo in Man of La Mancha am i you laughing remember I might write my memoirs and you will feature in them as you do not in Jeremy Paxman yes well I my right it will be with fondness by the way Heywood I can't believe his chance yeah you've already done that bit I had no in my form at school one of them became the head of mi6 no wonder we are so screwed up another one became a bishop I am NOT old enough to have people who were bishops God and his terror is terrifying and it's it's amazing because it wasn't a sense a new career I spend my summers now with a group of students who were between sort of the youngest about 19 the oldest opposed graduates are about maybe 28 29 30 and they're extraordinarily clever talented irreverent bright and fun and and you know I spend my summer with them making an idiot of myself and I mean sometimes literally as in when you play Sexton as the silent in once upon a mattress and I played John Hancock in that musical which is so rarely performed in England 1776 and I was absolutely delighted to go to say I'm the only British born member of the cast and I'm the only one who is descended from a signer because my great great great great grandfather was Charles Carroll of Maryland who was the one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence so on that on that note did the wrong side win in 1777 of course they did yes there wouldn't have Trump running nah he might be in the cabinet you never know he might be foreign secretary no that's that person that post was filled and before I get into any more trouble I've got a number of thank-yous I'd like to thank first of all like to thank Ben that extra two pounds fifty which will go to the Kent Opportunities Fund so thank you I'd like to thank all of you because you're generous in coming here that also goes to Kent Opportunities Fund and of course I'd like to thank the wonderful burner corner you

Channel: University of Kent

Views: 16,603

Rating: 4.7664232 out of 5

Keywords: Bernard Cornwell, Sharpe, sean bean, napoleonic wars, author, writing, french revolutionary wars, napoleon, historical novels, history, novels, fiction, historical fiction, the last kingdom, Sharpe TV series, history series, tv series, rifleman, waterloo, battle of waterloo, waterloo campaign, warfare, the sharpe stories, the saxon stories, horartio hornblower, CS Forester, richard sharpe, peninsular war, 95th rifles

Id: Qhxy-wPQk6k

Length: 58min 52sec (3532 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 22 2016