Tatler House Dialogue: Veteran diplomat Kishore Mahbubani shares anecdotes from his newly published memoir

“Just having conversations with them, listening to them, watching how they dissected global developments, I think that changed and transformed me,” Mahbubani highlighted, in reference to the shift in his political philosophies, from being a pacifist at the start of his career, to becoming the realist that he is known as today. 

“Great leaders are always forged by exceptional circumstances,” Mahbubani said, tracing the transformation of Singapore, from British and Japanese colonial rules, to fight for independence and later against communism, and into an Asian powerhouse. “Their greatness were a result of tremendous struggles. If you haven’t been through that kind of adversity and hardship, you wouldn’t have developed the kind of fortitude that these three leaders had.” 

It was also with the influence of these leaders that Mahbubani developed not only his own style of diplomacy, but also his own voice, and his own way of public speaking, to become the prolific writer he is known as today, and who has spoken around the world. “One person whom I learnt public speaking from was Lee Kuan Yew. The first and most important thing that he taught me is that when you walk into a room, obviously the reason why you’re standing up on the stage and talking to people is that you want to get their attention,” the diplomat shared.

“But Lee Kuan Yew, the minute he got onto the stage, he would make sure he captured the audience—and that was rule number one. And the second point is that he was incredibly economical with the use of his words. There was no fluff. He never wasted words. So you know that he wanted to hang on every word because every word was very carefully chosen. And he made sure that the audience was aware.”

Mahbubani also talked about his writing process. “I wake up on the weekends and try to get to my writing table by 9am. I put on music from Mohammed Rafi—if I don’t listen to this Indian playback singer, I cannot write—and then bring out a pen and a yellow foolscap paper and I write longhand.” He writes about 1,000 words per hour, and completes about 3,000 words each on Saturdays and Sundays. “But this doesn't happen every weekend. With a book like mine, which is about 80,000 words, it takes about 13 weekends,” he shared.

Even so, what was interesting is that “I have the least expectations for this book,” Mahbubani said. “All my other books, I want to emphasise, have very serious missions. With this book, there’s no mission, I just had to write my story. All I had in mind was a couple of ideas for my children to know what kind of life I had. I assumed that nobody would be interested in it.” However, much to his surprise, the book made it to No. 1 on The Straits Times’ Weekly Bestsellers list after it was released in early September. 

Currently a distinguished fellow at the NUS Asia Research Institute, Mahbubani launched the Asian Peace Programme in 2020 to promote peace in Asia. “One of the things that most people aren’t aware of is the biggest danger to human beings comes from wars—and you can see what’s happening in Ukraine and in Gaza. If there’s one place in the world where wars should be happening, it’s Southeast Asia because there’s more religious, racial, cultural, ethnic diversity in Southeast Asia than there are in any other part of the world,” the diplomat pointed out.

“So the question is, why do we have peace? This peace is the result of having great leaders in the past who laid the foundations for Asean—and this peace cannot be taken for granted,” Mahbubani said. “It’s important for more Singaporeans to understand what we need to do to keep Singapore and the region peaceful, because if we don’t want your children or grandchildren to be fighting wars, we must learn to cherish peace. Peace requires a lot of hard work, a lot of dedication—and that’s what I'm going to dedicate my life to.”

On that peaceful note, the floor was opened for questions from the audience, just as a storm brewed outside, bringing heavy rain and strong winds across Singapore, due to the Sumatra squall. Guests later got in line to purchase their copies of the book and get them signed by Mahbubani, while everyone mingled over canapés, wines and non-alcoholic beverages by Limwood Gourmet, along with sweet treats by renowned Swiss chocolatier Läderach.

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