conversations.from: human
conversations.value: a plot for a book about Ford, Henry, Henry's entitled The Dead Republic
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Dead Republic: An aging Henry Smart is attempting to cement his reputation.\nJohn Ford plans a movie based on Henry's life, but Henry eventually realizes the film that Ford has planned will reduce his story to sentiment.\nHenry plans to kill Ford, but his callousness has faded, and he drifts into the Dublin suburbs, where he meets a respectable widow who may possibly be his long-disappeared wife.\nHenry ages in obscurity until the 1970s, when he is caught up in the 1974 Dublin car bombings and the Provisional IRA uses a distorted version of Henry's story as a public relations ploy.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the first sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: \nJohn Ford plans a movie based on Henry's life, but Henry eventually realizes the film that Ford has planned will reduce his story to sentiment.\nHenry plans to kill Ford, but his callousness has faded, and he drifts into the Dublin suburbs, where he meets a respectable widow who may possibly be his long-disappeared wife.\nHenry ages in obscurity until the 1970s, when he is caught up in the 1974 Dublin car bombings and the Provisional IRA uses a distorted version of Henry's story as a public relations ploy.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the first four paragraphs for this book
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Dead Republic
  It looked the same. There was a break in the clouds, and the sea was gone. There was green land down there. A solid-looking cloud got in the way - the plane went right in. It was suddenly colder. I stopped looking for a while and when I looked again it was back down there. The green thing. Ireland.
  I'd left in 1922. I was flying back in, in 1951. It was twenty-nine years since I'd left, and five since I'd made up my mind to come back.
  The plane dropped a bit more. It shook and rattled. The ground was getting nearer; there were no more clouds. I looked down at my country and felt nothing.
  It landed - there were the jumps on the tarmac, and the burst of clapping from passengers in front and behind me, cast at the front, crew at the back. Me, in the middle. I didn't clap. The engine died.The propellers became visible, and stopped. I watched two big-faced lads push the steps towards the plane. I heard the door open, and the rush of real air, and gasps of excitement. There was sea in the air.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: three more paragraphs. Start with the sentence 'I lay there for hours'.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: I lay there for hours. There were no more explosions; the ground stayed solid. I lay beside other stretchers. I spoke to no one. I stopped listening.
  It had been a beautiful day. I still remembered that, and the street and women with their jackets off - before it all disappeared. It was night now. There were lights, torches, camera flashes.
  His face was even nearer now, because himself and the young lad at the front were lifting the stretcher into the back of an ambulance.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the last five paragraphs. End with the sentence ' I'm Henry Smart.'.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The war went on, because it had to - the pressure had to be maintained. They tore up Enniskillen, they made human bombs out of terrified husbands, they kneecapped men because they didn't like them. They smuggled diesel, they shifted heroin. They killed children in Warrington and shopkeepers in London. There were diehard millionaires who had to be appeased. There were mad fuckers, clowns who thought the dead deserved more than the living; they had to be brought along or bumped off. The splits had to be dealt with and corralled. Good suits had to be bought, bad hands had to be shaken.
  I thought I'd die. I'm well past old. But I'm still here. I can walk if I'm picked up out of the bed. My daughter is almost ninety but she can do that, when she wants to. I can go as far as the front door. I can sit on a warm day.
  They think they have me. They call - they check. There are six years to go, to 2016. They think I'll be there, on the podium with them, declaring the next and final republic.
  This is the last time. The last time I'll let myself be picked up off the bed. She'll understand. She's tired too.
  I'll close my eyes, finally, tonight. It's early afternoon, a nice day. I've seven hours left, maybe eight. I've lived a life. I'm a hundred and eight. I'm Henry Smart.