Were irish who fought on the other side, including the very people who were the kids of his best friends. Also i have a scene in the book where they fight the irish couldnt get into new york, philadelphia, baltimore, would continue going, and they came in through new orleans. New orleans was one of the main ports, later for italianamericans as well, but one of the main ports for irish entry. They had a little unit called the fighting tigers which wasnt formally an irish brigade, but an irish confederate unit. Its just handonhand combat of the irish Brigade Fighting the irish tigers and meagher wondering why the hell arent we directing all this energy against england. Anyone else . Any questions i think we have a gentleman coming down the way here. There we go. Timothy, i want to ask about you. How does a person make the transition from a very good local newspaper reporter into a pulitzer prizewinning author . And what made you think you would make a living at it . [laughter] the last part is the best part of the question. [laughter] yeah. Boy, you know, my mother loved literature. She had seven kids, and she loved storytelling. And when i was a little kid, my mom i think i was 7 years old, my mom gave me this book and said read this, and itll change your life. It was huck finn. It was, like, he was the bart simpson of his day. He was smarter than all the adults. It was so magical to see kid power. And that brought me into literature. And so ive always loved writing and storytelling. And i got it from my family, i think. As to the, you know, how what made you think you could make a living from this, you know, people raise this question every time theres a new take call device. Steve jobs said at one point that the iphone would be the death of literature, because depth of reading because he said death of reading because he said people dont want to read anymore. Certainly, its changed our Attention Span. There was a story saying that the average Attention Span is now eight seconds, which is less than a goldfish. [laughter] according to the study. [laughter] but, i mean, i wrote this as i was reading the second volume of william churchills biography which is nothing more enjoyable that going really deep into a fantastic book. So the making the living part, look, no matter what the technology is, were a storytelling people. Were not going to lose our love of story, our love of knowledge, our love of literature, our love of new information. And i dont with care if its on a screen or a pixel or appears, you know, on a thing in front of our eyes. I say this to all young writers, if you feel you have a story to tell, dont worry about where it appears, just work on the story itself. Also i have one more thing in that regard, and this is something that most of us we do have a disproportionate amount of irish writers. And ive always heard the saying that the best stories happen to those who can tell them. So [laughter] is there another question . Yeah. I was curious, like, how long did it take you to compile all this his historical background, you know, for this story . And what kind of sources did you use . So i used mostly firsthand sources, and the information on meagher happens to be in some of the greatest places in the world. So you start in ireland, and you go spend time in the Wonderful National library of ireland, dublin, where all the papers are from the young island rebels. Theyre notes they wrote when they were in captivity, poems, the newspaper that was the paper for the rebels and contemporaneous accounts of what it was like while they were giving their speeches and people were dying in the streets. I used some of the illustrations from those papers in my book of the starving. They also had their houses torn down during the famine as well pause they couldnt pay the rent. Because they couldnt pay the rent. Then you go to waterford, which is a beautiful town on the river, i recommend it. You can go into meaghers house, climb the hills where he climbed. They just named the longest suspension bridge in ireland for Thomas Francis meagher. He wants to start the revolution, but his fathers like, no, youll hang. And hes sort of torn. And the masses of waterford say we wont let them cross the bridge, and you feel that power. Then you go to tasmania which, by the way, is one of the prettiest places on earthment it really is beautiful. Its too bad the brits tried to make a penitentiary out of a continent. To this day, by the way, if you live in australia or tasmania, you can trace your ancestry to the convict stain is a badge of honor. You know that . Yes, i find that too. So then you come to new york, and theres this fabulous research at the americanirish historical society, at the new York City Tenement Museum which you can understand what it was like to be in one of those tenements. A lot of papers there. Then you walk the Civil War Battlefields which, as an american, i think every person should do. I had never done it. Its so so profoundly moving. And the National Park service, lets give them credit. They do a great job of keeping those american markers intact. So i walked the wall up to marys heights. And you see, my god, these guys were totally exposed. There was no way for them to go. Theres formations just getting mowed down by industrial strength or artillery and musketly. And then you go to antithem and this awful, awful place where 23,000 people died, and the library of congress has all the civil war correspondence. Most of its on line now so you can read meaghers battle reports in that. Finally, you end up in virginia city, montana, which isnt quite a ghost town yet. You can get a bison burger and a beer [laughter] and theres a great library, and they were very helpful, and theres a handful of folks that lead tours. In the summer it comes to life as a tourism place. And the Montana Historical society, thank god for them. Because meagher was their governor. They have this wonderful research. So my research is i like to go to the places so i can understand the texture. [inaudible] i mean, that took a couple years. Once i have the material, im a fairly quick writer. But i, i do all my own research because i think you find these great discoveries by going down these little warrens. I want to thank you all for coming. Im going to within this up. Ill wrap this up. Ill start with a plug for one of my favorite fiction writers, richard flanagan. I want to thank you for attending, thank tim for a terrific [applause] and i hope you all become friends of the festival and, please, ill ask you to, please, vacate the room because theres another panel coming in the here. You can meet timothy out at the booksigning area. Thank you. [inaudible conversations]
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