He has won several awards for his work, among them the International Prize and the shore and the esteemed journalism award. The publication he writes for and within new york review of books, new yorker, New York Times and the guardian, which the guardian recently published a highly learned and highly entertaining review of the British Museum exhibition and leisure in japanese art. Japan 1863 to 1964. In the year zero, most of which he wrote while he was a fellow 2012e center in 2011 and to the serious envy of the fellows that he was so productive. He has produced a billion brilliant portrayal of the world emerging from the devastation and unspeakable horrors, thetacle skeptical about idea that we can learn much from history, he nonetheless wanted to know the end including his own father went through. For it helped him make a sense of himself and indeed all of our lives in the long dark shadow of what came before. Zero magnificent in its modesty and the Financial Times describes it as elegant, humane and luminous. The men honored at the New York Public Library lion has five, andmore than 80 most recently, state of england. He received the black memorial prize for his more experienced and was named the 50 greatest british writers in 19 five by the london times in 2008. 1945 seems to be tonight. We are fortunate to be able to listen in on a conversation between two mature writers well and questions from the audience. There are microphones on both sides. Rather than try to speak chair. And then they will sign books, so please let them get out to the table to sign is welcome. [applause] this is a tremendous book. It was amazing organizing a great deal of turmoil. The aftermath was determined itself andthe war shaped by the events that preceded it. Apart from being uniquely devastating in the 55 million and many ruins and all the , it looksn we know of increasingly weird and grotesque from some aspect of the war. It was not wondered into like the first world war. It was one man. The japanese experience is slightly different, but can be almost considered separately. But one man got this about. The only time hitlers ever made me smile is when i think it was just before the invasion of , which set the warren motion, but he was questioned by a general and said i havent gotten any nerves about this war. It ever since 1918. The fact that this one man most theany, the best educated country on earth, the best educated country that had ever been into this exploration of the best deal, which is what happened, it was still remarkable. The weirdness of much of the sort of inherent in the war. It is the great crux that no one cannot answer can answer. Bit and say that a the germans went like man to the slaughterhouse and got to work. Your german connections and feeling for germany, i think you did exceptionally well with this ambitious book because of your connection with england and america and holland and crucially in japan. I do not think it helps necessarily to know germany well or japan well to explain the human propensity for extreme violence. One of the reasons i am happy to be on the stage with you is because i think we share a sort of horrified fascination with why people are capable of doing terrible things. That are people who say you can explain this because the germans had an extermination mentality, that the japanese are unique barbaric and cruel. I do not believe that for a minute. I think that your question is a good one. How is one of the most highly educated and civilized countries in europe produce so much extraordinary violence because yes, it was hitlers that let it, but he could not have done it on his own. He had very active participation and i think hitlers one example and perhaps the most extreme example in modern history that there are others on a smaller scale of the political regime that deliberately exploits and is basic instinct think the idea that there is a torture in all of this is probably trite and not true. Not all of this but it is true that if the authorities in government give people license to do whatever they like with other human beings, you will find large number. You cannot put a particular number on this, but you will find a sufficient number of people who will do their worst and at least torture and kill. Livedf people have perfectly happily together again,that, and i think people often say for example in the balkan wars, people explain serbian violence against muslims, saying that these are ancient hatreds and they should find a way to explode the certain time. , evenot think that hatred though there are all kinds of ,yth that keep coming back manipulated by politicians and leaders and so on in order to put people up to violence. But i do not think theres such a thing as the smoldering hatred that occasionally like a volcano suddenly first spontaneously. It is always orchestrated. I think that one of the best examples of this in my book in 1945 is what happened particularly in czechoslovakia or poland, where large german populations whose families has theredaft have lived for centuries, and suddenly the polls and the checks were given license by their own leaders as well as the allies, who did nothing to stop it. There were told, now you can do what you like, we cannot live with these people anymore, they have to be expelled and in a way, do your worst people people did for several months. German naturalist german nationalists to claim that what happened in poland and czechoslovakia or what the germans in germany suffered from the soviet red army, which was also horrendous in terms of archer,d killing and that somehow this was just as bad as what the germans did to in trying to not rewrite, but a different complexion on these. Review ind in that the bookork times, review, that what you did not do deheroize theas allies. That goes along the lines of the allied bombing, the paradigm of that and the return of the i think youns where half a million dead, that is a bit more. Returning russian prisoners of war to certain enslavement. That we have revived colonialism, gave it a shot in the arm, and saying things like the resistance in france. Articularly was not that that has become the myth, but the truth was Something Like collaboration. But i find myself very much reacting against that inner visceral way. Equivalence. Oral one should remember that war asll refers to the interestingg and concept was that they get old and the bigger they are, the faster they age. Of a lot, a kind of patience is my way of putting it. But we do not feel that, do we . He said while we created the United Nations and the european community, we destroyed hitlers. It was a necessary achievement. One cannot take away the heroism of that. But i think that bleak conclusion that one can draw is can very often, heroes quickly turn into villains. Or example, the soviet red army fought like heroes. The sacrifices of the soviet soldiers were extraordinary. They fought like lions and it was unnecessary fight and without them, they we would not have defeated hitlers. But they had behaved like beasts often when they invaded germany. Likewise, they were an army of rapists. When a woman is raped, she switches off the procreation of all mechanisms you might like to know that there are millions yes, indeed. Because e soviets, the Japanese Occupation of the , theries in Southeast Asia asians in those countries, the local populations certainly did not want to go back to the state , whereas the dutch and the french to some extent did have backion that they could go to the prewar order and take back the colonies. The nationalist in these collaborated often with the japanese, quite understandably, because they saw that as their chance to liberate themselves from their european colonial masters. Europe,r the war in these nationalists were depicted as collaborators. Who was sent to algeria and the Dutch East Indies and other places to put down the anticolonial, nationalist rebellion with root and often up atrocious force, people who fought against the nazis. My point is that human behavior, the atrocity and extreme violence, is not a matter of character or of culture, it is a master of sir matter of circumstances. These are the same people that can behave like heroes in certain circumstances, can behave like animals in others. You findinding that if yourself if you find you have someone completely at your mercy, the human thought that comes next is torture. General, make note in in this book, why violence has continuing to decline. The reasons he uses, one very important notion that took a lot of reestablishing itself after the war was, who had the monopoly of violence . And that must be the state. The idea of what makes the nationstate. Not in this country. I have always thought that americans have not accepted that preset and they want to be able to stand up to the u. S. Army if things should get slightly tyrannical in the white house. Policet has been the has been what have stop violence going back centuries and that gathering force. You may be interested that the novel made a big difference because stephen king does not like the word empathy. He heard a mother screaming at one of her two children, screaming, show some empathy question of what the novel promoted, do you think that this is erratic . I do not think so. Culture not think high makes us into better human beings. This is one of George Steiners great hobby horses how is it possible that an ss officer who can play schumann absolutely beautifully and read poems by greater can the next day aloft peoples fingernails. I do not think it is really all that mysterious. Nor do i think that higher into moremakes us moral human beings. I think it is a question of, as i said, of circumstances. Of moree if you think recent wars, it is a real moral dilemma because when you talk about the monopoly of force, Saddam Hussein certainly monopolized force in his state and in an extremely brutal manner. It was a state in which torture was widespread and people were gassed. He was a torturer. He monopolized it. That one thing that people fear more than a brutal dictatorship is anarchy, in which it is every man for seeelf and chaos, which we to some extent in libya now. To some extent in iraq as well. That thingsmean would be better if we had left Saddam Hussein alone, but it is something that people should think about a little bit more because before they casually say, we as americans, it is our duty to fight the dictatorship and ring freedom and liberty for us to do so. They should have listened to what saddam said ubiquitous torture and terror. Terrible, dictates oral order. For most people, it is probably preferred to the violent anarchy. Violent anarchy, in many ways that you have until 1945, until order was reimposed. Ideology. The period 19401945, it was not a war on religion on the face of it. Obviously, the sense was that ideology, religion was like heroin and ideology was like methadone. Down,ngs you trembling milliona bit of it 100 for communism and fascism. Also, the border is not always so clear. Phases,ost violent there is not a huge distinction between religion and ideology because it was also a religious colt in which people could be tortured to death for trading on a newspaper with his image on it that his religion at its worst really. It is a cult. If you think group overemphasizes young peoples behavior throughout their life, is great study of that Police Reserve battalion 101, where it is established that the killing squads went off behind in poland and russia, they , women andeveryone , andren and then all day no one ever got punished for seeking. They were not sent to the front, they would be transferred and all you might have in the meantime is a bit of jostling there was not a single chance of anyone being punished for requesting a transfer. Yet they would shame themselves in front of the group, they would kill women and children all day, every day. Did not necessarily enjoy it. There was a wear and tear on the nerves. Which is why the gas chambers were employed. After a while, the killing is a strain. Drunk, and it was considered to be cleaner and more efficient to have gas chambers and people that operated the gas chambers were not usually germans either, it was left up to the victims to do that. So it is not necessarily the case that they found it easy. The other thing is, while we are on the subject, i have often theght that the reason why and,nce and civil wars again, to come back to the act germans, thehnic reason why they are so particularly brutal and the killing almost always goes together with humiliation. You go to india, the last famous theance when the seats sikhs, see it over and over. Who set upon their neighbors and it was not enough to kill people the way that the jews were killed. It was not enough. They had to go it was always proceeded by humiliation of some grotesque time kind. I think this is speculation. One of the reasons is that it is not easy for one human being to motor and other human being, especially if they identify with them as their neighbors, if they look like you and so on. It makes me it makes it easier if you reduce your victims to the status of an animal, some abject creature crawling around in the mud. Then you are killing an animal and no longer a human being, which is why you have to reduce people to that state. Animal eyes asian. Imalization. That is why they were referred to as cockroaches on the radio. It is easier to kill cockroaches than your neighbor. If the holocaust had never happened, we would regard that how the polish jews were terrorized, exploited, and had to work for the conqueror. Report the ghetto in warsaw, if anyone still has any sympathy at all, they should t go and have a look at they have no selfrespect. Not even come in distance, etc. The way they treat their children. The children were starving. Ratherers found it unpleasant at the concentration camps. He fainted, nearly. German in 1942, they were machine gunning mental madence and people had gone while killing women and children in the east and i thought something was not quite right in germany. Hand, and 45,r after the liberation, russian raped, often teenagers people sometimes on their deathbeds. Careful. O be a little when you read about violence, there is the danger of ofraphy over violence violence. We are frightened of it and therefore fascinated by it, but always someone has to be a bit careful that you do not start to revel in the description of it because there is a pornographic element and how one guards against that, i have no clear answer to it. It is a factor. They call it when you come , unwelcome,rible rich human experiences. And it is close to sex. That is why i think there is a pornographic element. People read about violence with the fascination of not entirely unrelated to the fascination about reading about sex. Many of the americans had tions. E directions erec e, there was a ,tanding ovation in congress hymns a battle him that was on the top of the charts for months. No. There was sort of a horror that americans they are capable of doing these things as germans are. People often when the japanese took the Chinese Capital at the time. Ande was massive rape killing. It has been explained that the japanese were particularly cruel and barbaric. How is it possible that an army behaves like that . Even though it was known for its discipline . Lai explains a little bit what happened in world war ii. When soldiers are in a foreign country. They dont understand the language. You could be shot at by anybody. There is a distinction guerrilla fighters and soldiers. They would not have seemed to be entirely human. I would like to read a sentence. Ish this book does so well capture the amazing complexity of all the different theaters in different situations. How ramified it all was. This is talking about yugoslavia. Along religious lines. It sounds a bit like syria. Look at greece and and in asia. They dont in the after they have done that. What wars do is they deliberately manipulate, resentment. In france, the vichy regime would never have come to power if it wasnt for the german occupation. In greece, the antagonism between the left and right goes back to the prewar time. The resistance comes from the left. Old guard become collaborators with the germans. That goes on after the war. In italy it could have been a civil war. France was simmering. They were deliberately inflamed by the german occupation. It is not that you topple a dictator or bring them rigell dictator to heal. The problems go on. They have been made worse by war. How do you contain that . Who has king or a queen the legitimacy to patch things up. Talk about that. Now it is time to pull together again. It was probably a necessary thing to do. They very clearly divided the world. He said he would not support a revolution. Talk a bit about japan. It is very extreme down there. The emperor had to confess that he was human and not divine. Which came as a great relief to him. I dont think anyone wants to be a god. Talk about the protest. The difference between germany and japan, after world war ii, the allies had a hazy idea of what had produced all of this. What explains what the nazis did . One of the most common theories that churchill believed and was it was because military spirit that produced all this. Later we knew better. They were the officers, the colonel to try to assassinate hillary 19 before hitler in 1944. They were relatively speaking gentlemen. Been a clear takeover in 1933 by a criminal regime which came to an end in 1945. In germany you could make the case that if you get rid of the nazis and the government, you get rid of them. Armany could be restored to decent european country. It was the country of mozart and goethe. N and there was a real culprit. In japan, it was also simple. There was no equivalent to the nazi party. There was no holocaust, even though there was a lot of killing. There was no deliberate, systematic attempt to exterminate an entire people. There had to be another explanation. It was the samurai spirit, militarism, something deeply rotten about japanese culture. The feeling was there was something so wrong about ,apanese culture, warrior like that the whole culture had to be turned upside down. Kabuki plays about samurai had to be banned. Everything to do with feudalism. To democratize japan along american lines, they had to be reeducated in a very fundament away. There were some comical instances of this. Whoe was a man from kansas was in charge of a town somewhere in japan. He thought that square dancing with the answer. He thought it would democratize the japanese. Japanese men and women have to show their affection equally. The occupational authorities decreed that they had to have the first somatic test. It was hugely popular. Unlike germany, they had to be reeducated. That was the key phrase of the time. The japanese were so frightened that the americans were to to them what they did to the chine