CHRISTIAN: This is the only sort of relationship I have.
ANASTASIA: Why?
It's the way I am.
E L JAMES: I wanted the books to be
very non-judgmental about everything.
I don't see the world in black and white.
I'm very suspicious of people who do.
I think the world is all fine shades of gray.
And, so, I decided on that for the title and for that for his name.
So, everything about it is ambiguous.
Is this a good thing to do? Is this a bad thing to do? Is this...
I mean, it's completely up to the reader to decide.
It started back in the day on the 27th of December, 2008.
I picked up Twilight and started reading it.
I loved it. I read it again, and I read it again, and I read it again.
And then on the 15th of January I started writing a novel.
And I read about something called fan fiction.
I didn't know what fan fiction was.
I thought this is interesting and I looked up.
It's where you take somebody else's characters
and you do various things with them.
I thought, "This looks great."
And I read a couple of fan fics,
and I decided to have a go myself.
And, so, I wrote a novel. A 70,000-word novel in three weeks.
And while I was doing that, I had the idea for what became Fifty Shades.
And, basically, in my youth, I used to read a lot of romance novels
while I was commuting in to work, I was on the Tube,
hiding the covers 'cause they're all,
you know, maidens with their clothes falling off,
and men's torsos.
So I was reading a lot of that.
And I had also picked up a book
by Pat Califia called Macho Sluts,
which was about lesbian BDSM, which was fascinating.
And I read a little bit more about that.
And I thought, "What would happen if you met somebody
"who was in this lifestyle and you weren't, what would you do?"
And that's how Fifty Shades was born.
At the beginning, I knew that Ana,
who was this sweet, shy, compassionate young woman,
would be far stronger than Christian was,
afihoughit wouldn't be obvious to her, or particularly to the reader.
It's only as the story unfolded,
you actually realize how strong she is.
No!
And with Christian I knew that he was a deeply damaged individual
but hid very well behind this facade
of his huge success as a businessman, entrepreneur.
So, he was completely and utterly emotionally challenged
in dealing with any kind of relationship
because there was a huge part of him missing.
Let me touch you.
JAMES". It's basically about two people who
are trying to find a link and a connection
that's so obviously there between them,
and such a physical attraction,
and trying to overcome this issue of how he leads his life.
You said you didn't do romance.
JAMES: I knew from the start that it would be a passionate love story.
I always described it as a love story with a kink.
I published a chapter at a time
when I was writing it on the internet,
and I can honestly say that nothing I have done
beats the thrill of pressing publish.
That was the best time of my life.
I met some amazing women,
who are still with me, still supportive,
I'm still friends with them now.
And it was great fun.
The problem was that it became more and more and more popular
and I got very concerned that someone was gonna copy the story
or to use the ideas from the story because there were so many,
that I decided to publish it.
And I did.
(WOMEN CHEERING)
It was a crazy time. The fervor in the press,
because you couldn't actually get hold of the books.
They were all print on demand and on e-book.
And, so, that created this frenzy that was ridiculous.
They flew out of the warehouse.
They just couldn't print them fast enough.
(LAUGHS) The publisher ran out of silver ink just for the book covers.
And they sold so, so quickly. It was unprecedented.
WOMAN: This is so incredible. I think this is forever.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
JAMES: From the feedback I've had,
it's been women who speak to other women about these books.
The word of mouth is the thing that's
driven the sales more than anything else,
in college, at work, at bridge.
Spanning every generation, from too young,
to I've had fans in their nineties write to me.
No crying, though... I'm so nervous.
...'Cause you'll start the rest of everybody.
My heart's just racing.
JAMES: I think they're responding to the passionate love story.
I think that's fundamentally what women like to read.
And it's also a complete fantasy.
You just fall into the fantasy and get swept away.
Big smile, now. (CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKING)
(INDISTINCT SHOUTING)
JAMES: The New York screening, our fan screening that we did,
was such a tremendous success.
It was so wonderful to see the fans' response to the film
like they've responded to the book.
I was so pleased that they enjoyed
what we had worked very hard to bring to the screen.
(CROWD CHEERING)
It was an amazing experience for me
to walk in there and feel that energy and that passion
all kind of capped in that room.
It was an extraordinary experience,
and one that I'm not going to forget for a long time.
(CROWD CHEERING)