We're presenting it on Corps broadcast with the late Tom Wolfe recorded in 2012 Tom Wolfe died on May 14th 2018 at the age of 88. Wolf is the author of more than a dozen books including contemporary classics the right stuff the Bonfire of the Vanities and a man in full. He spent his early career in newspapers as a general assignment reporter and a foreign correspondent and is widely thought to be the inventor of new journalism . Was still a reporter Wolf published his 1st book a collection of articles about the flamboyant sixty's. The work cemented his reputation as a noted chronicler and staunch critic of contemporary culture. Wolf's new novel Back to Blood is set in Miami and features a fascinating cast of characters and the same high energy reporting that filled his previous bestselling books. On Nov 1st 2012 Tom Wolfe visited the hurt Theater in San Francisco to be interviewed on stage by Stephen when. Join me now for a conversation with Tom Wolfe. Was . A question about new journalism which you are so famously associated with and it's so you know kind of almost poignant to think about journalism having a vitality you know back then in a way that is so different and we can get to talk about that later about what kind of journalist you would be if you were starting out now but I want to ask you about the sort of consciousness I know you wrote a wonderful introduction to an anthology of new journalism which came out some 10 years later but at the time when you and your fellows were were doing it was there a consciousness really that we are kind of inventing something new that we are then I can say there was any kind of collective feeling I was I had read a piece by Gay Talese. In which it began with Joe Louis landing in Los Angeles Airport. And he's meeting his 3rd wife he's come to the plane with me and he gets all of their places of says Joe was a matter of the your ties and then I knew you haven't shaved. What has happened and he said well I kind of stayed up late last night in New York this is always at the theater was called. I stayed up late last night you know I didn't really keep track of time he said yeah when you go to New York you think you're 25 you come back out here I got a 75 year old man. Take care of my reaction. How did Gay Talese know that they had this very intimate personal conversation and I figured well he poked him not you made it up of course he didn't diverse group of journalists he had stayed with Joe worse today is he has a personality is very good at doing that. And he took the flight of course was to us and has a subsequent scene in which we're now in the living room of Joseph Sutton wife. And he she has remarried. And there's a party of people and she insists on taking films of Joe Louis funny and entertaining the guest by putting this on the screen. And when it gets to the 30th round where Louis. Knocked out Billy caught on to Billy Conn was. Had won most of the 1st 12 rounds and looked like the upset of the century and that and the 2nd way and for all these people saying this is where Billy Conn makes his mistake he suddenly think he can slug it out with Joe Louis and it is that at the 13th round goes on she's giving jabs and hopes and sure enough he knocked Billy con out and then from the corner you hear her say 2nd husband and he says. Well that was a quick count if I ever saw one. And again I said he's making this stuff up piece nobody can it can be headlines like that of course again he was just had made a point of ingratiating himself was worse than staying with him for days and if you know after a while people tend to lose their wariness of a reporter and fact I think if you can stay with a subject for a day and they haven't thrown you out they can't get the guard up that much longer was one of things I wanted to talk to you about sort of the transaction between the reporter and the subject which is a fascinating subject in its own right but but before we get to that you know it's the very question that you posed about that that came in your mind about Elisa's piece that often comes up in in my mind and I'm sure many readers might like how did he get that how did he know that and I'm thinking of radical sheik which to this day is one of the great pieces of American journalism period of any period but reading it how did you it feels like you are a you know a spy network in the room who seem to be everywhere simultaneously and just a simple matter of how did you get You were obviously there at the party how did you get so much of the dialogue letter perfect like that and I I wonder I just read in Kuwait as a test of your were short in person is that I did I I'm pretty rough sounded now but I had learned Greg shorthand. I was not invited to the party. But I was waiting for. My wife to be who is with us here tonight. She was the art director Harper's magazine I was waiting to have her for lunch. And she was delayed by something and I saw the one around I wanted him to David Halberstam so awful. He would not any of his offer was. Nosing around his death. And here is this and that he has been invited to this party that Leonard Bernstein and his wife Lisa were given for the Black Panthers and 895 Park Avenue which is a grand grand building and turned out he had a great duplex at the top of the. And I said to myself one of Bernstein and Wayne a black passes the Park Avenue. I got it back plus we have to go see this one. I figured I thought then that the number of the Davidson edges invitation to a church well let's put it this way I I think that there was somebody on a committee somewhere writing down the names of those who were excepted so I called up again this is Tom of exactly. And sure enough there was a security check at the door of the apartment. You couldn't get in without standing in front of the dentist and sure enough my name was on the on the list so then I did what my mother always said I should do in a deuce myself to my host and hostess. Polite very politely they figured that anybody who was at that party what was for the Black Panthers I mean think of that person there for the Black Panthers. So I was I was there openly taking notes hide it shorthand. And the things that were happening. Were really quite. To me quite quite unbelievable. The field marshal of the Black Panthers which I can remember me was standing by one of the little Bernstein's 20 pianos in grand grand with him and he was saying in effect isn't put in quite his words after the revolution and I'm going to be places like this for 2 people. There's a lot of people who would do well to have some of this space here again he wasn't put in that kind of hard headed way and all during this learned Bernstein is an age when people didn't burn in New York and we didn't show up at a party and turn Maxwell's. Now you get thrown out if you don't turn up and just sort of naturally but he had a turtleneck sweater on and all during this talk was lecture by the Field Marshal of the Black Panthers he was a right on always was a leftist right on right on. Anything was just it was absolutely me he was out of from injure and he got in an argument with with one of the Black Panthers who was there and he kept saying But John Donvan listen you Don listen to anything. Whereas Barr and Barbara Walters ever Walters is oh well Barbara Walters was. In a real heart to heart talk with one of the as they call them Panther women. Who is there and she's saying but you can't say that about my children my children don't have to get be involved in anything that I'm involved in. I can voice this past who is a pastor woman about the wise words you have. The whole thing was just full. Of commas I am. With the meeting part of it started. So this is a lake and you bring in the fringes always to go out in other rooms and so on. Leonard Bernstein to surrender has come on French is. This I had the idea of writing a nonfiction novel as an instrument a podium. About New York based on the idea of a factory Vanity Fair. And this will be one chapter but when I saw this the old fire bell rang and I had a guitar thing in the printer. As I could I could only have you could keep you just had what you were there taking notes and sort of drinking all this in did anyone ever question you about it or they like the burnt lines and so forgive you there you were for. The black backpack Panthers I thought it was just one of the. Funniest things I've ever seen in my life that was my own that what that's what appealed to me about the whole thing I had no. To me it has no political meaning and it has social media and that's why I came up with the term radical She radicals but there she turned out to have been a bunch of them that year. There was a fellow living on General Lane in South happened to get much better than he had a party for Cesar Chavez and the great workers of California and I did I miss that I know it was happening. But then I got people would tell me about that at that time boogy dresses were very popular. And there were people who were. Caesar Chavez was making his rousing talk for the great work of the it was Wendy and the most I was so most of the women they were holding their hair down with one hand and their booty skirts down with the other so they're all kind of standing around like this actually those are the kind of details I just know you had said about about being a reporter that that the way to do it we lease the way that worked for you was to not try to fit in but to be a kind of Martian you said almost as if you were from another planet I wonder if you would talk a bit about that and how that again that transaction between subject and reporter work for you being because many reporters I think try to be sort of insinuate themselves into Pauline and and disappear into the background and so almost sort of calm a subject that was never your method at all I mean I assume that's what you should do and but I was writing about people. That there was not a hope that I was going to be able to be like my giving sample of a magazine piece again for Esquire on a stock car driver named Junior Johnson he was an angle hollar North Carolina. And the whole countryside around where he lived was the son of angle how I'm you could look at a massive and so I knew the race so I said Ok I'm going to be dressed to fit in so I had a green tweed suit. I had a blue button down shirt and black in it and I. I had a Borsellino I had no woman has a little fur surface on. Men I wouldn't want those that do any formal occasion whatsoever and I had a pair of a month strap shoes are going to the back over the over the foot and it was brown suede. And. Oh my God. I didn't realize how about 3 days into it and Junior just was very cooperative and. And then he took me aside about the 3rd day and he says Todd I don't like to bring this offices but a lot of my friends are saying to me Do you know who that little green man followed you around. It dawned on me that day that this my fitting in over. My got you know one week I'm writing about. A custom cars and next week months. Writing about hippies and. And and so forth I found there's just no use my trying to fit into any of these millionaires so I darted naturally enough for me the man from Mars approach you know I'm here I don't know what you're doing but I'm really interested and I was always this is I'm really interested could you just tell me what what I'm what I'm now looking at and I think for me that. For me was an article you were kind of the eternal innocent in a white suit and to turn I would not I was at least smart enough not to wear a white suit while reporting I would wear a blue blazer the rest of the year I had around but to have one of the blue blazer . Trying to please not to fit in but to not to stand out all of much when. When when your 1st novel came out Bonfire of the Vanities I mean one of the things that I mean all of the things you talk about are so evident there I mean right from the get go but the way that that book connected this one in some ways is the powerful trigger that you placed at the beginning of the book it's the accident in the Bronx that starts there but there's a wonderful episode in Back to Blood your new book set in Miami which. Which I wonder if you would talk about it's I don't want to give away too much of it to those who haven't read it but it's it takes place. Instead of on on a highway in the Bronx in in a in a bag and involving a ship in an every way overpass I want to talk about how that remarkable scene from which in many ways the whole book kind of unfolds you don't have the prologue about Master and Nestor going up to the ship's math all about it has to look at. Nestor Camacho is a 26 year old. Policeman 2nd generation Cuban and he has just been promoted on a probation basis from beat up the lowest rank to one of the special forces and and then one of them in Miami is a Marine patrol and so he's he's on probation it and for the 1st time his life he finds himself surrounded by all Anglos of color all. American. White crew there unusual in Miami the way he is this is the police are so heavily laden that 70 percent are. By 50 percent are Cuban and another 20 percent are of Latin American division. And. One of the of the 2 Anglos. Starts talking about all the Canadians that. Every leaves global university and he says himself master Canadians. I don't know of any Canadians never heard of that and finally dawned on of that's their code word for Cubans. Whenever they want to these 2 angles one refer to a q. And as a Canadian. And this really as you can imagine takes him off and so he's the sergeant who's the ranking often on this boat. Says something to him. In us that's a slightly cutting way something a superior officer will say to. A beginner and nobody will think much of that's just the way that people superior rank talk and. To which Nestor says Well I would know. You don't say that off. Because they just Sarge I'm not a guy I'm not aware of that but you know that I would know now he realizes that he is really in trouble he's on probation the sergeant has the power to just kick him out of the marine patrol so he's determined to do well here they are sent out on the so-called safe boat to investigate on a Marine patrol that's there that's the marine people to. Investigate a case in which a stoner with a 75 or high mass. That has stopped in front of a the wreck and back a causeway ways you come from the south of Miami the 1st causeway around and it starts still and there's a man up on the highest mast who's screaming to the people going home on Friday afternoon on the freeway the causeway. And so they are to investigate and get the guy down. It turns out he's a Cuban refugee that fell off the top mast and he's begging for. Asylum he's been dropped off by a so-called cigarette boat heard those 70 miles an hour on the water by smugglers smugglers smuggle people are collies or Unocal and they drop it is often the water they want to or dare they were sure they might get caught and so he's floundering around he sees this ladder he thinks is a ladder up the land. Instead is a ladder on the back that's it's a land he you know whether they thought he thing that they're divided into. Dry Foot and wet foot if any Cumulus is a flood or nationals only means their plight of acumen if you can touch American soil or anything judging on from Arkansas like a causeway or a Jedi or anything you're cannot be sent back to Cuba you can be arrested and prosecuted for time you can be sent back and so this guy is about 60 feet you don't have a massive 60 feet from the causeway I think it reached the causeway he will be dry for. Here are both These are what. Are the main thing on the minds of the police is that all this traffic a small lot of Russia and the Miami police are not interested in signing a legal aid has it got enough things to worry about this affair of that so they get there and so the sergeant at the Anglo says you know Spanish you I was important go up there to get at that mass and you tell him that we are not arresting him if he has a if you can show that. That he is a credible threat. In Cuba. He will have he will have a son so Nestor who is a bodybuilder. Goes climbs up 75 feet on a rope because it's faster with a just as hands because it's much faster than clapping your legs. And he gets up to within 10 feet of the sky turf 5 of us cop. He suddenly dawned on him he doesn't know the word for threat yet most of so many 2nd generation humans. They know when it's up to about age 12 by this time they've started watching American television going to American movies people in school mostly speaking English. And he doesn't know the word for threat they also and this is much more understandable if if you know a little bit about Miami would he does not know even a word credible is the same in Spanish graded Lee. He doesn't know it maybe he just does not want a word for credible and he does not know the word for threat so now he's up there 10 feet away from the guy and he does things like flash the pieces. And he says he says a few things in Spanish that don't make any sense. In terms of asylum. And so the. Refugee who's up there panics and he starts trying to get away from him and he starts sliding down that Jim cape the say just cable or the job line from the mask goes to the front of the proudest ship. And. Boy enough to come out you can see see is that he's not likely to be strong enough to make it so he goes down the rope cable and he classed as. Legs around the guy and holding the sky between his legs he managed to go 100 feet down those lines which is. All it did for which he is his mercifully crucified by his own right unity if you know ordinarily a feat of strength like this and bravery tremendous bravery is up to 75 people here would be applauded but there is such a feeling over the fact that he has. Brought down this. Cuban refugee who claims to was yelling that he's a member of the underground. That this is treachery you know you don't you just don't do that to a Cuban refugee Alan get your copy what you are you don't do that and it is a he goes home thinking you're having to get the applause of his family and his father standing there with his arms crossed as it comes in through the door he says . If you had done that to your parents. You would not be born. Because the old man and his what wife to be and the grandparents have all come on a makeshift dig. Through storms and everything else it took them 2 weeks is dying of starvation they made it to Key West and so his own father is saying and he says but look I was ordered to do it oh a lot of people a lot of inevitable ordered to do it too. Well that the way that the the whole sort of tension between 1st generation 2nd generation the whole enterprise the novel really just everything that happens after that seems to kind of spin out of that your your intention here as it often is with the novel is to kind of take on a big you don't start with a character necessarily a situation you think I'm going to write a novel about this big issue and for you in this case it was about immigration as I understand you actually thought about writing a very different book originally that's true I. I became fascinated with immigration those are still working on my book before that. And occasion people said what are you thinking about doing next and I say. I think I do a book on immigration and response is always the same oh it's so interesting and then. They fall asleep like a horse standing you know standing up. So. But I was still interested. And I 1st thought of the Vietnamese in California. Huge numbers of Vietnamese were around Los Angeles and then I discovered they had come up as far as certainly as far as San Jose and probably further. Because in addition to the famous newspaper the San Jose Mercury there was now a vs America. And it is that there's a very interesting story to be told there but my interest is what not how they get in but what happens once once they're here and. Then it down I couldn't speak. The enemies and I cannot read the Viet mercury so there's a big problem here. And they were just that was just one immigrant group and then I heard about. Miami which apparently is the only city in in the the world in which people from another country with a different language in a different culture. Have been slightly over one generation taken over a big metropolitan area through the voting machine that loved the Congress have done that. Through the voting machine and that. Every sort of immigrant has ended up in in Miami today though lots of Russians have come in who figure prominently in your book actually I do. Because every rich Russian thousands are gone but so I have a hog are Kerry who is. In the book but they're also in new as I'm as I think I knew him of all Haitians there Venezuelans pouring in the fleeing Cesar Chavez when you went and you're another Martian again going into Miami but you had some help when you went in there you had some some folks who kind of are should you into the world that that that that are unfolded in your book please I have a little I had a great luck of getting a letter from out of the blue by a young man no man named after Caroll who 2nd generation Cuban who'd worked for The Miami Herald and he's out of the blue it's a slow go to come out of Miami take a look at what goes on. At you at that time you were already thinking about a book about immigration was that right that kind of the spark that that turned yeah was and then that it said to me here's a place to do it there's so many different groups and they are colliding and I quickly discovered that there is no melting pot in Miami they put all the NGOs in the pot and it was like finding the invitation on however some desk and this was another one exec in a way an accident. And you wait 2 months nothing is nothing they were. The. The other thing was a John Timoney who had been the deputy police commissioner of New York. He had been police commissioner of Philadelphia now he was the police chief at the highest rank in Miami and the police chief of Miami there he was an old friend of mine and he opened up all kinds of doors to me that he put me on one of the. Rescue missions on the marine patrol. And so I was right there not on the boat as they were those things are wild ride they go 45 miles an hour not quite a figure of. So I did have a lot of help and he knew a lot of a lot of doors to open but my way of working has always been a facon find one person whom I can get along with in one area of a place like Miami or. I can usually make my way on. From there if they haven't gotten tired of you in 5 hours you have a shot it going on to the next day you're listening to Tom Wolfe in conversation with Stephen when this is city arts and lectures for the outside world I'd lay claim to have this severed Hialeah. Hialeah as a says a town that borders right on the northern border of Miami when I arrive like I ask goes a lot of of people I thought only of the racetrack. And there is this form of the gorgeous racetrack is still used for curious events like Quarter Horse races . But is now a it's a city of 225000 people and I'm sure that about 200000 a marquee event. And there's a so called Little Havana within Miami that's caught on coyotes and you go to the verse I Catherine you have a cup of Cuban coffee when you walk across the street you see the old men playing dominoes and you've been to Little Have hour in fact it's full of Nicaraguans. Right now but highly is the real thing itself is not not that small it's not that little. And. I. Mean that's a hot this discovery highly opens up a whole new to me in a way whole new side of. Human life immigrant life it's just and I maintain unless you go and see these things you really can't you can't write about fast anything about your work as a novelist because the idea of Rip going to do reporting as a novelist sort of seems to run against the grain of what a lot of people think that the novelist is about invention and about inspiration and drawing from some types of how different is it when you're researching a novel as opposed to researching a nonfiction book I thought I could get away with less research and I found that in the bonfire Landis' for me anyway is impossible to have do just as much if not more of my main character and I did the bonfire of Venice serially for Rolling Stone 27 episodes and became something rather different when it came it all in my main character saving myself a lot of trouble with a writer the unfortunate thing was he lived on Park Avenue in a very swell apartment house she sounds familiar and I don't act out or know any writer living in a sort of. Park Avenue but there may be one. And so you thought you were you thought you were faking it a little bit you hadn't given it up Baxter and develop it just didn't it just wasn't right and then I happened to hear about what was going on on Wall Street this that goes back to 184. And Wall Street was riding high there were no scandals at that point and through an old friend of mine I went to high school with him he was on Wall Street and he got me in the Solomon Brothers and I spent 2 days at Salomon Brothers another oh my God here's a guy to have at the center. Of the book at that time on Wall Street these young men who are making tons of my thought of themselves as the masters of the universe and that that and the character I give the character that actually phrase in the book is called Sherman McCoy. And that was the feeling that was the feeling. At that moment and that work and United spent 2 days of sound brothers watching the traders working and I said this is a revenue I rewrote the entire book. Was Hialeah sort of the Comanche did I mean those little cats eaters in that world that your folks so specifically those little screen doors or all of those tiny rooms and stuff it's just so wonderfully evoked in the book was that it was highly of the thing that really kind of made it come to life or you know it there because you knew from the coming in from the south you go under this huge sign. Done in a slightly old fashion start on 120 is walk on the highway obviously a welcoming you to the racetrack there was nothing else there for about 500 people in what is now highway. And and you go through the arch now and you see these the seeker's little houses we would call them bungalows probably and they just go on forever. And they're not bad houses is there one story there the plot of ground 0 about 50 feet by 100 feet. And then you notice that half the front yards are concrete. Things don't grow well and Hialeah was really kind of a dusty plain racetrack arrive. And so one of the things that I. My friend after corral his wife pointed out to me is in the mornings the the women go out and spray the concrete front yards but no man must do it. It is demeaning a status thing it's a status and you know exactly a man would look less of a man if he if he washed of the concrete. And so one thing after another you can I think you can only. Pick up if you if you know if it was a much does that so I mean the Miami Art Basel scene and the Russian oligarchs and the the black police chief and the kind of race politics that goes on there we're going to bring the house lights up and let you all join the conversation here and the question comes from your left of the orchestra on the front my left because it's also I know you are create out server human behavior you've gone into some very. Interesting areas have you ever thought of basically doing something in Congress. You know you know. I don't know what this is about me but I find the our government not particularly interested for the following reason. Our government Thank God for it is like a train on a track the federal government talking about. And there are people on the left yelling at the train their people on the right yelling at the train. But the train has no choice it's on the track if you keep going down the track and you'll notice the candidates all get driven to the middle. I mean oh my God it's just. Is happens over and over and Ronald Reagan was a get rid of the Department of Education when he left office 8 years later it was bigger than it had ever been more employees the budget was double what it done when he came in then Bill Clinton his wife arrived and they're going to institute national health. Sort of British style and you know I say that lasted all 3 months and that it just wasn't going to fly so they feel they give up that if you look at Clinton's policies in the 2nd. Term that you never saw anybody more straight down the middle. In your life and that's why when we have. To kind of this who both seem to me you know. Very pliable. I think we can we can be pretty sure they're going to be. Riding on a train to. So you know it's not like human politics or anywhere in Latin America that's why there's so many and in our elections. The outgoing president at the inauguration shakes hands with the incoming. You not going to see that lot and. The outgoing president going to be running for his wife and I should make a I should make a blanket statement like that but American politics is to do polite to be interesting well it's to it's steady We don't have 3rd parties usually Perot was the strongest 3rd party I think we ever had. And this seeming increase polarization hasn't hasn't interested you are you don't find that to be I honestly I don't know what the polarization is yet. The the concept of class of classes just doesn't take root and maybe not the concept it is always an invalid starting with Thomas Jefferson that was a determined goal on the part of the veteran government to make this country as much unlike England in terms of a class system as could be done. In fact when England finally recognized the United States. As a nation it was a big event and the British ambassador comes to the White House Thomas Jeffersons is present here arise with this marvelous British. Historical gear on ceremonial gear including a small sword in a scabbard to show that there was. Jefferson was dressed but he met him in bedroom slippers. As if to say things are going to be different. From now on at dinner. They arrived in all the tables and thought of being rectangular we're round that was a Jeff and to this day there are around there's no head of the table. At the White House and then he announced to the gas in this great ceremony of that list sitting down it's going to be the pell mell method every pell mell And yes yes if you get your seat you like it is yours and he did take in the wife of the Bastard there and. Sat her next to him but as far as the ambassador resigned he was on his own. And people were scandalized but it drove home the thing that we I don't think Americans think in terms of what you cannot say something demeaning. To a mechanic or anybody else and I can remember my father once taking saying something slight and demeaning to a mechanic and his response was. We don't take that in this country we don't take that class it's what is your obsession with with sort of superficial signs of status things like the right low for the right car or the right thing is that our version of class is that the way we express that same kind of instinct that this is really what I would call status or status consciousness but we tend to break out selves and this is my opinion in 2 groups where we fit in. And within that group you may have. Levels of rank but it's so easy let's say for myself a reporter and a writer to start believing that the only thing important in the world is reporting and writing and that world that I live in the good old boys in the south. I've been among often they think of themselves as the salt of the earth but if you're not wearing the bit of overalls on some equivalent. You stand out in a way you don't want to stand out and the right Deb overalls presumably not just any devolve into the real bit of overalls and very very distinctive as opposed to blue jeans and things like things like that take another question if we could my question is about your previous novel. I guess it occurred to me that. For a gentleman of a Certain Age naming a novel I Am Charlotte Simmons there must be a story behind the naming and I'd be curious to hear. Or you talk about that to tell the truth if I could afford it I'd 1st think of the thought of a more generic titles of all sorts of back to what it was it's about a particular subject I would have but I I want back to the 19th century. Model and. You know Joseph Andrew was but I made it I Am Charlotte Simmons and but I think in that case it worked here's a girl from the hills spider North Carolina. And there is a spider. You think they can raise their Christmas trees Landa so he'll. Be on the Christmas tree is interesting anyway. And she's coming into a university that the equivalent of. Certainly of of Harvard or. Or any ideally universally Ally put in Camden New Jersey for a reason. Canada is a city that's full of the pieces and a lot of universities are now located in places that were suburban or even out in the country and today are falling to pieces as cities and anyway. She is an idealist. And she's going to live you telling us that you know live the life of the mind. And it's her rude awakening that the book is about and she in the beginning is always saying that I Am Charlotte Simmons I'm not like other people I don't have to go by their. Rules and customs but once you get interested in like a college setting it's just because they and nothing else the pressures on you or. Are terrific and it's all about the way in which she buckles. To to the pressures as much criticized by the way. For at my age I was then. In my mid seventies. Pretending that I can write about a college college life from the viewpoint of the specifically about about about sex on campus and sex on campus and through the eyes of a girl of it's sort of thing where Believe me it's what if you're 25 and you're doing that and you do not know how to record. And you don't make it your point to look at every body you can find. That's the person who's out of step not the $74.00 level I think of $74.00 that was published and now. I find myself called an octogenarian writer. I would say look it's just a hobby. It's something I like to do at night it's not my job and people can't they can't that there's can't believe. That you could be my age. And actually walk around and. Commune You've never shied from a fight in fact you've provoked several of them famously after. After bonfire came out you wrote a piece called stalking the 1000000000 footed beast about what you thought was wrong with the novel and then when Updike went after you uptake and several others went after you after a man in full you waded into the fray again I wonder how when a book like Charlotte Simmons which did get treated somewhat unkindly in certain quarters how much do you care about that I mean do you do you read your reviews and are you are you distressed by them or encouraged by them or misled by them or do you ignore them or some overly always. Steal the words of Arnold Bennett who is a very popular British novelist in the twenty's. He didn't get a very kind of literary treatment and he used to say I don't read Mario's I measure them. And I'm fond of saying that but I have never met a writer who doesn't read who doesn't read the read. The reviews but honestly I've been through so many different kinds of reviews from the. The worst the most unfair and the. And the wonderful I'm afraid overgenerous reviews that. I think I'm a little more tough skin than most this has happened to me so many times but you can't fake it you can't it's that. You can't claim that you don't get wounded you know right is every given us on the sleeves of the. And why did you decide to respond to it to Updike who called Man in Full in entertainment is not a novel What was that something that particularly got under your skin or well I would have said any that would have written a tease. Which is called My 3 Stooges. Unless there'd been 3 of them and there was. There was Norman Mailer uptake and John Irving. Now. The 1st round of reviews of places you look to 1st like New York Times Book Review. And. Oh they're only in the magazines like Time hiding his we use we can and so on gave our manifold terrific reviews Oh and Vanity Fair the 1st and his nose like manna from heaven my contention was that these 3 guys I'm at the all are opening reviews of that fabulous they would I let this pass and I can tell you. To have to it is unimaginable that people their age would stop everything else and write or read a review at length at length about some other person's novel is on it's unbelievable in the case of Irving. I mean I or repeat is the infirmities of Updike and Miller would say all mention in interviews. Updated said that. That that he had a bladder. And he attributed this to age. And so I went to some leaves about it if you can blather. And Mayor had a few rusted out knees and probably was one hip. And he was kind of staggering around town so I thought that should be noted on their game or I mean they have to pull yourself together physically to write a book review C'mon next question comes from your left again on the very front of the orchestra just a little bit farther to the left all the way to the side we are there and Ok I'm getting well I'm getting my direction so I was wondering if you could describe the difference between the relationship you develop with a protagonist that you create for a novel and the relationship you develop with a real person whose life you explore or excavate in working on a piece of nonfiction. I don't know as we don't need all that much. Difference in nonfiction. You really can't pull your punches if you if you do then you're becoming a p.r. Person. And I've had plenty of. Give give you one example of. Alan Shepard our 1st man in space. Never forgave me for my. Just descriptions of him a certain and in certain ways believe he never he never he never forgave. But I say you have to write. In the nonfiction the truth insofar as you know it and I've always written about living figures in nonfiction. Because that it's so much more of a much more of a test and so much more vital to people reading it then then in the century writing history. And. Sure in the novel. If you're not writing about real people and I'm not writing that real people and I will if there's a real person I want to write about all write about him and and in nonfiction. You have much more you have much more of a thought of Michael Morell liberty but to me it all ends up it all ends up. The same I'm just it's it's it's fatal to pull punches Razzak when I wrote The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. Back in his eon his merry pranksters for about 5 years he did not one comment. About that book which was all about him and his followers and finally somebody like the Rolling Stone interview they did tend him down on that book the electrical in Africa and. His answer was Well I think he got pretty much of it right he says the only time he went wrong was when he tried to be nice and he went straight to a scene in which the Hells Angels were giving probably the 1st party of a different anybody. Wasn't quite that way he had invited the Hell's Angels to his place of Wanda California. And they. Had started again. A gang bang. With a woman whose identity I knew. And at the climax of this really rather gruesome scene they got her former husband they brought he was high and they brought him into the shack where this was all taking place and the all hooked and hollered while he participated in the rape. I will confess I could not he were right he doing right to that same. I pulled my punches I acted as if I did not know the names of these 2 people either the former husband of or the woman and of course I knew I knew very well and he was right. I had pull I pull the punches it would have been certainly a more powerful scene possibly a more powerful book and you would have written it differently if you if you you know if you'd had your full well I would have probably weren't the same way but may have been a gruesome scene as as it is but to both of these the man in in that case is somebody who featured prominently in the book. Is there anything else that you I mean not that you regret this that is the very thing you've written that you regret I mean either a book report of a book or something where you say gee I wish I hadn't done that or I wish I'd done it differently Oh there's been plenty of things I think I could've done. I could have them better I mean anything any particular thing he said Gee I wish I hadn't done that that was a mistake and I don't remember that happening. One last question from the audience . The Right Stuff was a term in common usage month fighter pilot test house but never as part of the language who did you pick it up from who it was a specific person or was it just part of your process when dealing with these people that you doctor that term and made it part of the language I found that term very close to where we are right now. Well. In. Very near very close the open. I have an old friend Kylie one who had the time. He wanted to be a police and it was one of his great ambitions as he in the family is this guy at that time you had to be 5 feet 7. And he was 56 in the have a death in never worked out eventually became a policeman a girl they didn't have that restriction but when he was he would work as a security guard making perfect good good living. But I was on a conversation with him and he said you know. As a security guard if you are proved good enough you can end up in charge of security for an entire shopping mall and you can make 150175000 dollars a year says but in your heart. You know that the Metropolitan cop is the only one with the right stuff. And I got that term from him. I dedicated the book to him also. And. That terms this sums it up and in the pilots would never or afraid ever put into words they would never talk about courage. They would never. Talk about danger they would only talk about the. Unacceptable conditions. It was as close they ever got to study their courage. And and so on and I was so to the right stuff really says you know I think you'd think that titles become boring because I can't tell you how many people sent me a book about school days a novel about school days and. The Right Stuff and I now have probably the world's largest collections of The Right Stuff by Ian Now Tom what you've been giving us the right stuff for close to 50 years thank you so much for being here with us thank you thank you been listening to the late Tommy conversation with Stephen with recorded herds theatre in San Francisco November 1st 112 Thomas died on May 14th 2018 at the age of 88. These broadcasts records were city arts and lectures in association with k.q. And deep public radio San Francisco founding director Sydney gun store executive producers are Holly Mulder one and chief Goldstein production assistant Alexandra Washington Nourse theater technical director studio at the post production director Nina Thorsen. The recording engineer is gin and then engineering supervisor Monte Carlo whose director of Radio affiliate relations Eric blind still seem realistic composed and performed by pact police and Joanne Wallace is vice president and general manager of k. Through a new book Public Radio. City Arts and lectures programs are supported by grants for the arts of the San Francisco Hotel Tac stand. Additional funding for Vida bought the Wallace Alexander group the foundation. The Mimi and Peter Haas found the Bernardo sure foundation and the friends of city arts in the us support for recording and post production of City auction that yours is provided by Robert Nana Anderson and Nicole moment. To attend a live program and will forward this to the upcoming guests visit our website at City Art stop new city arts dot net. Pushing the arts in the chairs and kinks you have the radio. Well coming up tonight at 8 it's America abroad revelations of Russian meddling in the 2016 u.s. Presidential election were a shock to Americans but it wasn't quite as surprising to people in the former Soviet state and the e.u. In this episode you hear stories of Russian descent from ation and attempts to sow chaos in Europe and the United States and what can be done to counter it hear more about it tonight at 8 and again tomorrow morning at 2 right here on k.q.e.d. Public Radio 88.5 f.m. We have a cooler day today with temperatures in the mid to upper sixty's lower seventy's as we head in Lynn and looks like to be cooler tomorrow and we warming up once again when the weekend rolls around. Good morning I'm Steve Fox You're listening to k.q.e.d. Mady 8.5 San Francisco and f.m. 89.3 North Highlands Sacramento it's 3 o'clock. Good morning the trade war once put Beatles began recording the White album including the song Revolution news is next . From n.p.r. News in Washington I'm Barbara Klein Mexico is responding to President Trump's latest promise that it will pay for border wall Trump reiterated the valid a political rally in Nashville last night Jorge Valencia of member station k.j. Z.z. Reports the message from south of the border is no way President but he could Pena Nieto responded trumps favored medium Twitter and he said quote No Mexico will never pay for a while now that are out on the street there was a similar sentiment Fransisco be saying you know was on his commute home from his job at a call center and was kind of going and one of. Them and then he says he got this he said you says Trump tying us to the wall simply shows his need to keep hurting us down Mexico's presidential elections are one month away an aversion to the border wall might be the one issue most of the country agrees on for n.p.r. News I'm horrible and in Mexico City evacuation orders have been issued in parts of western North Carolina including old fort where water is quickly rising. Authorities say lake to Houma dam is an imminent danger of failing as tropical depression Alberto dumps heavy rain in areas already saturated by weeks of rainfall Forecasters say Alberto still threatened several Gulf states the Ohio Valley and it's moving toward the upper Great Lakes president Trump's longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen is due back in federal court today N.P.R.'s Ron Lucas reports a criminal investigation into his business activities is putting Cohen under immense legal pressure f.b.i. Agents raided Cohen's residences and office last month as part of a federal investigation into his business dealings investigators carted off electronic devices and boxes of documents including materials related to a payment going made to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her silent about an alleged affair with Trump Cohen's attorneys and prosecutors are now way to. A court appointed official to decide which of the Seas items are protected by attorney client privilege and which the government can use to build its case against him Cohen worked as both attorney and fixer for trying for years he has not been charged at this point but he is under increasing pressure as his legal troubles continue to mount. N.p.r. News New York authorities in Belgium say the attacker who killed 3 people. Including 2 police officers shouted an Arabic phrase for God is Great several times he was then shot and killed by police Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip say armed Palestinian groups agree to a cease fire as long as Israel does the same this comes as Israel struck dozens of Hamas and Islamic Jihad targets in Gaza yesterday in response to a barrage of rocket and mortar fire from Gaza into Israel one of the worst flare ups of violence since 2014 it follows weeks of unrest in cross border violence this is n.p.r. The Canadian government is stepping in to save a pipeline expansion from Alberta to the west coast of British Columbia Texas based kinda Morgan suspended operations on the project after growing opposition Dan carbon shock reports now plans to spend more than.