PBS高端访谈:小说家罗伯特·哈里斯重塑二战边缘的英国历史（在线收听）

Judy Woodruff: Next- Imagine at the eve of World War II a mission by Britain to prevent war with Germany. Jeffrey Brown speaks to an author who tells that tale in the latest book on the NewsHour Bookshelf.

Jeffrey Brown: September 1938, Germany threatens to invade Czechoslovakia. Britain fears being drawn into war just 20 years after the end of the first World War. The diplomats scurry between European capitals to negotiate, assessing each other's influence, strengths and weaknesses. It's the real-life setting for the new historical novel "Munich," the latest from author Robert Harris, well-known and read for his many imaginative takes on ancient and modern history. And welcome to you.

Robert Harris: Hi, Jeff.

Jeffrey Brown: You have written nonfiction and fiction about this particular moment. What is it that galvanizes you still?

Robert Harris: I think it was an incredibly dramatic story, four days in September 1938, when the world came very close to war, the moral compromises which had to be made to preserve peace, the controversy that still surrounds it, and the sheer drama of Chamberlain and Hitler meeting. And I have wanted to write a novel about it for 30 years.

Jeffrey Brown: So, these characters, it's Hugh Legat, the Brit, and Paul von Hartmann is the German.

Robert Harris: Yes.

Jeffrey Brown: Are they based on real characters or are they all imaginative?

Robert Harris: The background and the characters of Chamberlain and Hitler, who are both in the book, and the civil servants and so on, that's all real. And the places, Downing Street, the Fuhrerbau in Munich, Hitler's apartment, that's all real. But into that, I put these two characters. Hugh Legat is a completely made-up figure, 27-year-old, high-flying Foreign Office diplomat who is working Downing Street and flies with Chamberlain. And the German character owes a lot to a guy called Adam von Trott, who is one of the conspirators against Hitler who was killed in 1944. But he, I drew a lot on the character of von Trott for his portrayal. He was part of a kind of nascent embryo resistance to Hitler in the German Foreign Ministry, which I wanted to try and put in the book.

Jeffrey Brown: It's often said that you're fictionalizing history to sort of explore the what-ifs of history. I wonder is that what you see yourself as doing, or are you just delving into the history to tell it in a fictional way?

Robert Harris: I thought at first of doing this as a what-if. What if there had been no Munich agreement? Because part of the argument for the book is that Chamberlain and Hitler, actually, it was the opposite to what most people think. Chamberlain actually got what he wanted, and Hitler was furious with this whole deal. And Chamberlain's a much different character to Hitler. And so I thought of doing it as a what-if and showing that actually we might well have lost the war if we hadn't had Munich. But then it became too conjectural. So I decided really to put as much of the actual truth and facts in. So, I hope people come away with a different impression of the Munich agreement.

Jeffrey Brown: Well, and also a different impression of Neville Chamberlain. Right? In history, he's the great appeaser. In your book, he comes off better.

Robert Harris: Well, yes. Well, he certainly was the great appeaser, but he was a dynamic, driving figure. And there's no doubt, if you actually look at it, he got Hitler on the back foot, because Hitler wanted to invade Czechoslovakia and begin the war in 1938. And to the end of his life, he was lamenting that Chamberlain had cheated him out of the war. Chamberlain was hugely popular when he appeared in Munich. He got louder cheers than Hitler did. This drove Hitler mad. But he realized that the German people weren't ready for war. And Chamberlain did a very clever thing. He sort of appealed behind Hitler's back to the German people. And he postponed the war, and Britain rearmed much more fully, and also fought on a better issue, if you like, the invasion of Poland. Much better to fight on that issue than the taking of Germans back into Germany.

Jeffrey Brown: As a lover and reader of fiction and novels, when you're writing this, we know the ending. Right?

Robert Harris: There is a war, yes.

Jeffrey Brown: You build all this tension, and there is a great plot between these characters. But I know how it's going to end ultimately in the big picture. Do you worry at all about that?

Robert Harris: Not at all. One of the most successful postwar thrillers was "The Day of the Jackal." We all know that President de Gaulle was not assassinated. It doesn't stop it being thrilling. I did a novel called "Pompeii." We all know that Pompeii is destroyed. Actually, people waiting for the shoe to drop in a way is often a source of greater drama than when you don't know what's going to happen.

Jeffrey Brown: To the degree that you're looking at different periods of history, what does something have to have for you to want to tackle it?

Robert Harris: I think it has to have something perhaps that's new, one can say. It has to have something that's relevant. I hope that, from "Munich," people will take away the fact that whenever we use these loose terms about appeasement and Munich, actually, we're misusing them, and that there might not have been the great Churchill victory speeches in 1940 if we hadn't had Neville Chamberlain patiently trying to buy time and to make sure we — when we did fight, we fought on a big issue, and not something that people would probably have given up on if it we had gone to war in '38. So, I like something — if I can twist the history and show something new, that, I like doing.

Jeffrey Brown: What about our own moment? Do you see anything here that, in 10 or 20 years, that you might want to tackle?

Robert Harris: The trouble is, it's all so bizarre, you can't do it in fiction.

Robert Harris: It's putting political novelists, thriller writers out of business. I find it again and again with modern reality. It's so outlandish, there's nothing that your imagination can come up with that's more bizarre. That's why I often reach into the past. And if I was going the write something about modern America or in modern Britain, I might well go back and take a Roman emperor or something like that.

Jeffrey Brown: All right, that's one approach to our daily news.

Robert Harris: Yes, Nero maybe.

Jeffrey Brown: OK. The new novel is "Munich." Robert Harris, thank you very much.

Robert Harris: Pleasure. Thank you.

朱蒂·伍德瑞夫：下一内容——试想一下，二战前夕的英国派出了一项阻战德国的任务。杰弗里·布朗对话本书作者，在NewsHour Bookshelf栏目，为您讲述作者最新作品中的故事。

杰弗里·布朗：1938年9月，德国威胁将要入侵捷克斯洛伐克。英国担心自己在一战结束仅20年后，再次被迫参战。外交官在欧洲各国间匆匆斡旋，就对方影响力及优势劣势做出评估。由此引出了新出版历史小说《慕尼黑》的现实背景。此书是作者罗伯特·哈里斯的最新作品，作者声名远播，读者广泛，其小说中多蕴含着极富想象力的古代现代历史场景。欢迎你。

罗伯特·哈里斯：嗨，杰弗。

杰弗里·布朗：关于这个特殊历史时刻，你已写过众多小说和非小说题材作品。你的写作动力何在？

罗伯特·哈里斯：我认为这个历史时刻极富戏剧性，那是1938年9月里的四天，那是即将爆发的世界大战，那是为了维护和平而不得不做出的道义上的妥协，那是至今争议尚存的事件，那是张伯伦与希特勒纯粹戏剧化的会面。写一部这样的小说是我30年来的夙愿。

杰弗里·布朗：所以，这些人物，这是休·雷加特，英国人。这是保罗·冯·哈德曼，德国人。

罗伯特·哈里斯：是的。

杰弗里·布朗：他们依托真实人物创作还是都是虚构角色？

罗伯特·哈里斯：张伯伦和希特勒的人物形象和背景，在书中都有展现，还有那些公务员等，都是真实的。那些地点，唐宁街、慕尼黑Fuhrerbau、希特勒宅邸，也都是真实的。但在这里面，我安插了这两个人物进去。27岁的休·雷加特是一个完全虚构的人物，一位前途无量的外交部官员，在唐宁街工作，并在张伯伦手下任职。而这个德国人物形象很大程度上要归功于一个叫亚当·冯·特罗特的人，他背叛了希特勒，并于1944年遇害。但他，我在冯·特罗特这一人物形象身上着了很多笔墨。他是德国外交部里抵抗希特勒的一种新生胚胎力量，我想试着把它写进书中。

杰弗里·布朗：人们常说你在虚构历史，并有点以此探讨历史假设的发生。我想知道，你对自己的所作所为如何看待，或者你是否只是在钻研历史，并以小说的形式告诉给大家？

罗伯特·哈里斯：写作伊始，我认为，这的确是一个历史假设。如果《慕尼黑协定》没有签署呢？因为事实上，这本书的部分情节是关于张伯伦和希特勒的，它与大多数人的想法不同。张伯伦实际上得到了他想要的，而希特勒对整个交易非常愤怒。张伯伦和希特勒性格迥异。所以我想把它作为一个假设，并以此表明，实际上我们很可能会在这场战争中失利，如果我们没有签署《慕尼黑协定》。但后来它变得太凭猜测。所以我决定将其还原以事实真相。所以，我希望人们读完此书，对《慕尼黑协定》可以留下一个不同印象。

杰弗里·布朗：嗯，对内维尔·张伯伦也留下一个不同印象。对吗？在历史上，他是大和事佬。在你的书中，其实他的形象得到了提升。

罗伯特·哈里斯：嗯，是的。嗯，无疑他是大和事佬，但他是一个动态的、驱动性的人物。并且毫无疑问，如果你真的去看，他其实拖后了希特勒战争进程，因为希特勒想入侵捷克斯洛伐克，并在1938年开始战争。直到临终，他还在哀叹张伯伦，把他从战争中骗了出来。当张伯伦出现在慕尼黑时，他受到了热烈欢迎。比希特勒呼声更高。这让希特勒感到疯狂。但他也意识到德国人民还没有做好参战准备。张伯伦做了一件非常聪明的事情。某种程度上，他背着希特勒呼吁（号召）德国人民。他推迟了战争，这让英国武装更加充分，为一件更好（值得）的事奋斗，如果你愿意的话，那就是入侵波兰。为波兰而战斗比把德国人赶回德国要好得多。

杰弗里·布朗：作为小说爱好者和读者，当你在写这部小说时，我们知道历史结局。对吗？

罗伯特·哈里斯：最后还是开战了，是的。

杰弗里·布朗：你塑造了所有的紧张气氛，这些人物之间情节丰富。然而，我知道，它最终将如何在大背景下收尾。你对此有所担心吗？

罗伯特·哈里斯：一点也不。一战后最成功的恐怖片是《豺狼的日子》。我们都知道戴高乐总统不是被暗杀的。但这部影片的惊悚程度丝毫未减。我写了一部名为《庞贝古城》的小说，我们都知道庞贝古城如今已经被毁。事实上，比起未卜事态发展的人来说，那些知道悲剧结局的人往往更会成为戏剧之源。

杰弗里·布朗：就你所看待的不同历史时期而言，要想解决这个问题，你必须做些什么呢？

罗伯特·哈里斯：我认为可能必须有新东西，可以说。而且必须相关。我希望，通过阅读小说《慕尼黑》，人们可以明白，任何时候，当我们关于绥靖政策和慕尼黑，还在使用这些不受约束地表达时，事实上，我们都在误用。如果没有内维尔·张伯伦耐心为我们争取时间和保障事态，可能也就不会有1940年伟大的丘吉尔胜利演说——当我们真的开战，我们是在为大事而战，而不是那些如果在1938年参战人们会放弃的事情。所以，我喜欢做这样一些事情——如果我能扭转历史，为人们呈现一些新的东西，那这就是我喜欢做的。

杰弗里·布朗：当今时代呢，您有没有看到一些想在10年、20年后写的东西？

罗伯特·哈里斯：问题是，这里所有的一切都太过奇怪了，小说里做不来。

罗伯特·哈里斯：这让政治小说家、惊悚作家都没得干了。我在当代现实中一次又一次地发现了这点。它太古怪了，你想象中的一切事物都难以企及。这就是我经常描绘历史的原因。如果我要去写一些关于当代美国或英国的东西，我可能会回去写一个罗马皇帝或类似的东西。

杰弗里·布朗：好吧，这是我们触及当代日常所见所闻的一种方式。

罗伯特·哈里斯：是的，尼禄也许。

杰弗里·布朗：好的。这部新小说名为《慕尼黑》。罗伯特·哈里斯，非常感谢。

罗伯特·哈里斯：不客气。谢谢你。