Ken Follett (Cardiff, Wales, 1949) would not be out of place in the British House of Lords (although his sympathy for the Labor Party is known). His aristocratic bearing and dapper appearance – dark suit, white shirt and light blue tie, matching the handkerchief in his pocket, all crowned with very white and combed hair – seem typical of other times; not as distant as those he usually portrays in his novels, usually set in distant times. The most famous of them – more than 27 million copies sold around the world – is the one that has been brought to Spain. Today the musical theater adaptation of ‘The Pillars of the Earth’ premieres at the edp Gran Vía Theater. Iván Macías (music) and Félix Amador (booklet and lyrics) are its authors. The two have already signed, and with great success, a similar experience; the stage adaptation of ‘The Doctor’, by Noah Gordon. -You have already been able to see some scenes from the musical; Does it look like what you imagined? Do you put images in your novels when you write? -Yes, when I write I see a kind of movie in my head, and I hope that the reader does too, that they also see that movie in their mind. But I never thought about a musical. This is something new, it is different and it is wonderful, because music expresses emotions and when I write I also express emotions, which now come to life through music. -And in some way, your novels sound too? -I don’t think so, No. Specifically, ‘The Pillars of the Earth’, no, because it talks about a cathedral, which is fundamentally a silent place where people pray. When you go to a temple you usually find silence. I don’t think in musical terms too much. Furthermore, no one is entirely sure what that music was like in the Middle Ages. We don’t quite know what was heard then. -How did this novel come about? What was the point of inspiration? -I was working at a newspaper as a journalist, and I went to Peterborough to write a report. After doing several interviews I had an hour before taking the train back to London and I went to visit Peterborough Cathedral. I remember that the temple has three large giant arches, which seemed to me like doors for giants; I was surprised by its beauty and asked myself two questions: how could medieval men build this? And why did they do it? These two questions are the inspiration for ‘The Pillars of the Earth’. -And have you been able to answer them? -I think the book answers them, because we see characters who decide to build the cathedral and try to solve the problems that arise at the time. to execute your idea. Just as we wonder how they built it, they wondered how to build it and, as they solve the problems that arise, we begin to understand how they built it. -What do we have to learn today from those people? -In the Middle Ages the people who were very poor, lived in wooden houses, slept on the floor and ate food that we would not eat now; but those people were the ones who built the most wonderful buildings in the world, and therefore ‘The Pillars of the Earth’ is a story of people who rise above their condition. If there is any moral lesson to be learned, it is that people who live in humble conditions can build something that will last all eternity. Now we have no need to build cathedrals. -No, but we want to send a man to the Moon… It is something very similar; It is done for other types of scientific reasons, but there is also something more. We want to go to the Moon because of the challenge. «What interests me is understanding how we got here. Life was very different in the Middle Ages. Nobody was free, very few had education. And I like to understand the different changes that have occurred over the centuries. -Could it be that our cathedrals are on a computer screen today? -I don’t think so, it’s too easy. For example, the Sagrada Familia was recently completed after a hundred years. I don’t think anything on a computer can compare to building a cathedral or going to the moon. -As a writer, are you worried about artificial intelligence? -I have the ChatGPT app on my phone and I asked you to write the first chapter of a novel in the style of Ken Follett. When I read it I saw that it was very, very bad. It’s true that the artificial intelligence knew something about my work. It was a story where there was a duke who brought together people from different towns, and it was something that happened very far away; That is, elements that appear in my work, in my works, but it was boring, everything was full of stereotypes. I thought I could continue to be sure for a little while longer. -How long does the research work for a novel take? -Normally for a year I write what is the planning of the book and do most of the documentation. During the second year I write the draft and the third year I rewrite everything. This is more or less my work process. -Why are you so interested in historical novels, why do you look for the connection with our days in other times? -What interests me is understanding how we got here. Life was very different in the Middle Ages. Nobody was free, very few had education. And I like to understand the different changes that have occurred over the centuries. How people have been fighting for their freedom. Machines were invented that made people richer, women fought to achieve universal suffrage and they achieved it… All these advances, all these rights that we have: freedom of expression, religious freedom… I’m interested in knowing How has it happened? -There is a saying in Spain that says that any past time was better, you don’t believe in it, right? -Not at all. There are people who tell me what period of history would they have liked to live in? And my answer is: in none of them. First of all, if you had lived 50 years ago, you wouldn’t have a gigantic television; it would be small and the image would look green. It’s a silly example, but it is an example. Now everyone can watch a play, a series or a movie at home. Before, only the rich could afford to go to the theater. Ordinary people couldn’t afford to buy a ticket. In 1952, American television broadcast ‘Hamlet’, and that day a larger number of people saw the play than had seen it since Shakespeare wrote it. That’s a wonderful thing, it’s a huge advance. “I asked him to write the first chapter of a novel in the style of Ken Follett. When I read it I saw that it was very, very bad; “It was boring and full of stereotypes.” -And what do you not like today, what would you change? -In the last fifty years, political debates, both in newspapers and on television, have become childish. In 1971 I started working as a journalist in a newspaper, and the veterans were very strict with us young people. You had to know how to spell people’s names and not make spelling mistakes. And if one made a spelling mistake, just one, they told you: ‘Look, Follet, if you make a spelling mistake, those who read you are going to think that you make mistakes all the time. We young people were very afraid of making mistakes. Today newspapers and television have changed completely. Many things are reported that are not true. -Just yesterday an important agency broadcast the death of a writer, Fernando Aramburu, and it was fake news… -Wow! That happened to Mark Twain, but he was always very funny and responded like this: “the news about my death is exaggerations.” Today the most important thing is haste, you are right. That has been a change for the worse. -Are you working on a new book? -I am finishing a novel that deals with the construction of Stonehenge 4,000 years ago; People in Europe did not know how to write, the wheel did not exist, it had not occurred to them to use horses or cattle to drag stones. How then did people back then move those big rocks? To find out you will have to read the book.
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