Q.: You are clearly no less skilled at manipulating live conversation than you are at manipulating tapes. Occasionally the politicians you interview make statements that, seen in the light of past or present political events, seem truly astounding.

O.F.: Shah Pahlavi, for example, who said to me, in 1973, before the great oil price wars,"...it's only fair that you (Europeans) should have to pay more for oil. Let's say...ten times more." A little later, he denied this statement. Then he went ahead and raised the price.

Q.: But this sort of thing is only significant seen in hindsight; after all, the Shah makes a lot of unfulfilled threats in the same paragraph. Your techniques tend to elicit statements that may or may not have any relevance to the way these political figures act, statements that pamper to unsubstantive psychohistory.

O.F.: Listen, the book has no such ambitions. I state, in the first sentence, "This book does not claim to be anything but what it is: I mean a direct witness to fourteen political figures of contemporary history."

Q: Now I'm going to put you a brutal question, Ms. Fallaci. How can you claim the right to be even a witness of history if you reject the responsibility of objective reporting?

O.F.: You're really trying to get me with my own sword, aren't you. You've even adopted my phrase, that one about the brutal question. But don't you have a proverb, in English, "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?" For all your vulgar attacks, you seem to have read my interviews closely; they fascinated you, I can see from these questions.

Q.: Your interviews are fascinating, Ms. Fallaci, fascinating and seductive. So are you; the interviews reflect your personality, as you say in what may be the most revealing sentence in your book. But the problem is that the only voice one can be sure one hears in what should be dialogues is yours. This book can't claim to be a direct witness to some of the few who, you contend, make history; it's only your personal interpretation of these 14 people, based on impressions gathered over a few hours, at most. It's wrong to call your book an Interview with History. It's an interview with Oriana Fallaci.