If I can refer back to your first question about history and the way I use history in my novel, in my afterword I quote Octavio Paz who said that we live between memory and oblivion. That is an essential part of my concerns as a writer: the way we go from memory to oblivion and back again. History is not created by some sort of inscrutable force; it is created by human beings. It is not, as the old saying goes, a web woven by innocent hands. Rather history emerges as a result of people either willfully using memory to drive others into oblivion or allowing the experience of recent oblivion to create new antagonistic memories. I feel that history has a very vital place, but I believe that a problem in history is that sometimes you learn the wrong lessons. It is very important to use history with a view toward the future. I often joke that the best crystal ball is sometimes the rear view mirror: you need to learn from it to avoid and remember what you left behind. You glance occasionally at the rear view mirror but you keep your eye firmly on the road. That is what the United Nations too would like to do.

What do you see as having defined Kofi Annan’s career until today? How would you define the role of the UN secretary-general, and what do you see as the ideal characteristics of a UN leader?

I have enjoyed my work with Kofi Annan and learned greatly from him. I just think he is a fantastic human being. He is somebody who is a pleasure to work for in whatever capacity. He has also been an ideal secretary-general, if not the ideal secretary-general in the view of many who have studied this office for the last five decades. He embodies all the right qualities. First, he believes firmly in the principles of the UN Charter. He has dedicated his life to international cooperation and coexistence and working in harmony with people who are not like him, people from different parts of the world, people of different races, colors, creeds, gender—he has always enjoyed working across those differences. Second, he brings personal qualities to bear to the job that are indispensable; he has an ability to listen, an ability to empathize with people and their different problems, and a tremendous internal strength from which I think a lot of his decisions flow. His calmness and certitude, not manifesting themselves as arrogance or inflexibility, give him the confidence to be able to listen and take into account the views of others. He has come into this job really with absolutely the right sort of attitude and mentality.

One British journal once called him the secular pope for the world, and he always laughs off such designations, so I will not hang one around his neck, but in some ways he does speak for the international conscience. He is somebody who stands up and tries to speak for the larger interest of humanity, above that of any set of interests of any one group of countries or one individual country. To be able to do that you need first of all to be a person whose views are respected, you need to be a person of compassion who cares about the right issues, you need to have a strong moral sense, you need to have a strong political sense of judgement because you are working with various governments, and at the same time you have to be able to reach human beings. Kofi Annan, I believe, does all of that. Every time I meet people who are not particularly interested in the United Nations or world affairs, I am always struck by how they say we have seen this man on television and he just comes across as somebody they would be glad to follow anywhere. And that is ultimately what I think makes him such a valuable leader for the United Nations today.