Transcripts For CSPAN2 In Depth 20th Anniversary Commemoration 20240711

Light was on. She america is in the war. Why did that such you so much . It had gone lucid. What did that mean for you and hungary . I didnt cry then. How old are you . I was 18. That interview with the late author john lucas. In depth was formed 20 years ago. Since 2000, 230 leading nonfiction and fiction authors have appeared on in depth. Alice walker, bob woodward, Neil Degrasse tyson, george will, just to name a few. Over the next 3 hours our goal is to review the last 20 years of in depth and to ask you a couple questions. Who was your favorite in depth the guest, what book are you reading now, and who is your favorite Nonfiction Author . We will be showing you video from the past 20 years but here is how you can dial in on the twentieth anniversary of in depth. 2027488200 for those in the east and central time zones, 2027488201 if you live in the mountain and pacific time zones and you can text him what your thoughts are as well, 2027488903. Text number only, 2027488903. Your first name and your city if you would. Social media, booktv, facebook, twitter, instagram, you can make a comment on those platforms. We will begin, john lucas was the first guest on february 6th, 2000, the same year in 2000, William F Buckley junior, joan gideon, milton friedman, gore but all, Stephen Ambrose and arthur is less danger junior, heres a portion. The heart of an aristocracy are the schools. Interesting you use the example of your daughter, bush went to yale. I went to harvard had i not chosen the army instead. The schools control the opinion of the children of the rich and or powerful. I had a stepbrother who was going to inherit a lot of money, he was sent to groton st. Marks. For those who will be rich. Who make them into gentlemen and scholars and certain values. This is how opinion is formed by the ruling class. How to get political training but their view, i belong to the ruling class. I was sent to ecuador which was for the bright boys of the ruling class who worked for the rich boys, and we will become judges, senators, editors of the New York Times, those doors are open to us, bankers, but we are not properly speaking members. That is how it is done and how they continue it. There has always been a move in england where they know about the upper classes and we are not told, the most intelligent upperclass i have ever seen or overall, nobody knows they are there. They own the newspapers, the newspapers get the game on who controls opinion. And to be there and never be named, they have done marvelous work, nothing gets through to people at large and so they go on and on. Occasionally a maverick appears, and others. By and large it is a close operation. Host gore for doll passed away in 2012. His books include the United States and lincoln. The next three as were taking your calls on these topics. What are you reading, who is your favorite in depth guest and who is your favorite Nonfiction Author . 2027488200, those in the east and central time zones, 2027488201 in the mountain and pacific time zones. You can text in your answer, include your first name and city, 2027488903. It was in 2001 that fiction author Toni Morrison appeared, Pulitzer Prize winning author of beloved. Here is a little bit of Toni Morrison. How do you get inside the psyches of these people . It is difficult, maybe actors or actresses use, you have a vague character. You want to be in that persons head if you are on stage, where the clothes, where the shoes, behave the way that person would. So you have to intern or project and know where they part their hair and what kind of soap they would wear, what food they would like, try to imagine those things. That works for me. I dont judge my characters that way, whether i want to have lunch with them or not but you have to love them for the moment of their portrayal, whether they are men, women, old, young children, what have you. They come from your pen fully formed or they develop as you write . As you sit down and the book comes out the story is supposed to answer or provoked as i was, what must that feel like . Or in paradise to hear about the people, turned away black people, they are not welcome there. I know what the story is about. I dont want to know what she looked etc. I wanted to invent her so i only need a few strokes. They are never fully realized immediately. They take coddling and stroking and personal introductions, doing what they can do to speak and trust me. Host along with Toni Morrison in 2001, she was on in february, james mcpherson, selby foot, Richard Brooke kaiser, david hauber stand and David Mccullough appeared in 2001. When it came to Richard Brooke kaiser who started the show but the war in afghanistan started that day so we had to cut it short. We brought him back for a later date, one of the few ever appeared on the program twice. Mark in kansas city, which of those questions that you want to answer . Favorite author, what are you reading or favorite in depth guest . Caller my favorite author is mary roach. I have most of her books. Host did you watch her when she was on in depth . Caller yes and i have replayed it on your website a couple times because she is very entertaining. I like the way a lot of her books have the one word title, i have emailed her and she has emailed me back. She was a very good guest. Host thanks for calling in. Lets talk to david in louisville, kentucky. Good afternoon. Caller thank you for in depth. I want to answer the question about what am i reading, i am reading a book called twilight of the gods by ian w toll. It talks about the conclusion of the american effort against the japanese in world war ii. We had the 70 fifth anniversary of vj day and it is an excellent book. Host did you see that . Guest anxiously awaiting the third volume of the trilogy. Host is it world war ii that attracts you . Guest specifically Pacific Theater because of the notoriety of the pearl harbor attack, and the story of a difficult task. And it took an effort for us to become victorious. Sometimes we take in depth on the road and it was in september of 2016 that we went to hillsdale college. D in fronting i in front of n audience. Is it anyway we can come back the socialism is a utopia that the left is promoting and people of my generation because you and i both know they are systematically disestablishing the america that we love. Thank you and such a nice thing to hea nice things here from a millennial thats, thats exactlyha what is happening. Thats functional. Thats not opinion. They are im doing what the founders meant t to do. But this one simple answer aside from all the other arguments that i gave. Socialism bankrupt countries. This country will be bankrupt the bill will hold you and frank that no pity for you because your generation votes democrat. So, therefore, since im a big believer in consequences, thats what children should learn, i have zero pity for millennials the vote democrat for when the tab for the debt that they believe in by voting democrat comes to their generation. I will perhaps be gone or i will have my fine retirement account so has no effect on me but it local bankrupt just like greece, just like portugal, just like italy, just like spain, just like venezuela and we will, too. We will be a borderless country because the left wants borderless countries just like with the schengen rules and the european union. They dont believe in borders because they dont believe a national identity. There would be a country called the United States between canada and mexico but it will not be any different from canada or mexico. That is the left dream. This will all happen to you. You will read about the once great country that existed but that you helped dismantle because you, thanks to the indoctrination you got in high school and in college, voted for. For. Thats my message too millennials. A nonpitting message. Host that was Dennis Prager in september 2016 on in depth. All these programs are available to watch in their entirety. Lets talk to carol and Prince George virginia. Carol, good afternoon. Which of those three questions do want to answer . Caller what i want to answer is about my favorite interview on in depth, and it was a year that in depth did the year of fiction and it was david ignatius. Im a super fan of this thought it was such an engaging, really involve interview and it just appreciate it so much. Intelligence and the work of the cia. I dont have any professional background in it. Im a retired lawyer but ive always been fascinated by it and i think he does a job dispassionately, but respectfully relating what the work of the cia and other intelligence agencies are in terms of protecting as nationally. And saving our foreign policy. Host thank you for calling in and look at some of those fiction authors that we did i believe in 2018 that we did a full year of fiction authors and we will look at some of those as we go. If you cant get through on the phone lines and what to text in your message or social media your message, text number 2027488903. Please include your first name and your city and just remember at booktv is our handle for facebook, twitter and instagram. Shelby foote was one of the authors who appeared in 2001. In fact, we visited his home in memphis. On that desk there you also use the dip pen we talked about before. Show was thats the pin that used to be in post offices. Its an absolute nightmare. Its an odd thing to do and i dont know when i dont worry about that. I was lucky, i found a whole bunch of points at a dusty old stationery shop the used to be on 44th street. I bought myself a lifetime supply. What kind of paper you right on . That is a big problem. It doesnt taking the way it used to anymore so i have a problem with paper. What is this i have in my hand . Thats a manuscript of shiloh and at the end of each today i do the final corrected draft and put on the stack and then type it up on the printer. Is this the original or the copy . Thats the final days copy. Each day i would do what i done that day. I would in the day by making that final copy. You got up on the shelf there. How many other of your original last season shiloh, jordan county is not appear. September, my six novel. Any idea how valuable those are . No. What a going to do withit th . It into my son. What are some the things you have there on the back of your desk . Favorites of mine. Birthday party when i was about 11 years old in greenville with all my friends. Forest, robert e. Lee, u. S. Grant. Some of these one of your favorites. Absolutely. He from arkansas, and i was immigrant. He became a lawyer and was interested in a military because he had done a hitch in the military army as a corporal. Hes a marvelous gentleman. He was killed in franklin the last year of the war. Can legitimately close up on that board just so folks can see it not from such a distance . Why checkoff . He was born four years into the century but he was as modern today as when he was writing. He has a tremendous influence on the writing of the short story, all shortlu story writers influence for the good by checkoff. He had, he had a talent that you cant explain it. Walker and i used to try to forget how we does these things. We could never figure how he did it, he so good. Host and shelby foote passed away four years after that interview in 2005. Dale tweets in or a text from dubuque, iowa, i am currently reading cast the origins of our discontent by Isabel Wilkerson. I highly recommend she writes. Isabel wilkerson has now appeared on our q a program on sunday nights and on booktv as well. All available at booktv. Org or just type her in the search function at the top of the page. Ashland virginia, good afternoon. Welcome to booktv. Caller good afternoon, thank you so much for taking my call. I was prompted to call in by the earlier call from the woman who was looking at the Government Agencies like the cia. Ive had quite a bizarre life and i would love to share my name if i can because i am a vietnam era veteran changing the world from my dining room table come selfproclaimed to the heartbeat of america and im also a whistleblower. Theres a frontpage wall street journal that can be seen on the internet that i was written up and it triggered an investigation that eventually led to the resignation of jim wright from speaker of the house. I also have some interaction with a high level cia operative who offered a book, kgb, the eyes of russia, and has some very interesting synchronicity is that i discovered with him and a lot of other things. I even share common background with the president , will support any president in the office ignite people and culture properly but im not going on ego trip that the president is on and will still reach out until his last day to unite the people of this country properly. The secret Government Agencies have to be more transparent and empower the people with the freedoms that we have turned what was the name of the book again you wanted to recommend . Caller the title, they kgb, the eyes of russia, offered by harry. Host thank you. John in hutchinson kansas good afternoon tragic, yes, i have a question that you or somebody can answer. On tv i watch and the newspapers everywhere they talk about russian anything in our elections. Chinese industry with our elections, and this goes on and on and on but nobody says a word that they all say Foreign Government should not interfere with our election in any way, shape, or form. I go to channel eight which is our local , im going to interrupt you. We are talking about books today at her 20 anniversary of in depth. Anything along in the book world you want to comment on traffic no, no. I listen to television and read the newspaper. Host thank you. I appreciate your call. Brent in astoria new york good afternoon. What are you reading . Who was your favorite author and you have a favorite in Depth Program over the last 20 years transfer ive been reading this book by i i cant member the authors name but its dewey defeats truman. Host is that the new one, vha bayne . Caller yeah thats the one. Host he has a new one out on dewey defeats truman. Caller heard interesting book. Truman didnt have a good second term after he won i guess. This question about the favorite author have to be nonfiction . , if you have a favorite fiction author you want to bring up, go ahead. Caller it would be Thomas Berger. Hes not real well known but he has written about 18 or 20 novels. He died, he was 89 indicted 2014. He is only known willie for one book. It was Little Big Man but hes written, some people say hes not so well known because he has worked in different genres, its all fiction but he said like detective novels and contemporary stuff, and also he wrote a takeoff on king arthur legend. Hes known for his grasp of the english language. Nobody writes like the guy. Host where do you get your books, library, online, bookstore . Caller online and the library. But Thomas Berger is somebody come somebody said his stuff proves that fiction is stranger than truth. Hes just really, theres nobody like the guy, writes like him. I got on a site onetime visit if you like this author you will like so i said Thomas Berger, i entered his name. Tom delay of came up i think is his name. I got a book by tom, im not sure if im pronouncing the name right but its like white noise, couple of the books. Host is it a specific genre . Caller you mean host is it intelligence, national security, suspense . Caller i dont even know. I started to read it and it is like unreadable. The point is nobody writes like this guy, like Thomas Berger. Host thanks for calling in. In 2002 our guests included cornel west, tom clancy, peggy noonan, robert caro, david hundred donald, howard zinn, george will and bob woodward and a first guest of 2003 was phyllis schlafly, and heres a portion of her talk. Well, you remember kennedy was assassinated in late november of 63, and i was at the time the the president of the Illinois Federation of republican women and i had a whole series republican speeches scheduled beginning in december, and it just seemed inappropriate to give the standard at the Democratic Party speech so i worked up a new speech called how political conventions are stolen, starting the first week in december of 1963 and then i gave that speech january and february and it told a story of how the rockefeller establishment had outmaneuvered the conservatives and given the domination tempt ten me too ise thomas dewey. By march i realize to put in a book and influence the convention. So was a whirlwind year. I wrote it on my typewriter at night t at home and then of coue i self published it. If you go to publish its going to take themm two years to get act together. We needed it in 64. Thats the low publisher i set up to produce this book. I sent it off to the printers in march and 25,000 copies arrived at my garage on april 30. And and i typed out a onepage letter that said dear friend, please readag this book today ad then buy enough copies to send to your delegates to the 1964 Republican National convention. I typed it on, type in stencil in the states and had a mcgrath machine in the basement and it went down in the basement and put the stencil on the round think and ground 100 letters. One of the letters was read by a friend in california who called up and said i read them, im going to convention this week in united republicans in california with 5000 copies and i loaded them up at my Station Wagon and took them to the airport and set them out there and that we can reinstate wide distribution in california and the california primary was the first week in june and we sold over a half million copies between the first of may and the first of june in california. Where did the title come im reading also a fiction novel at a snails pace called raptor from gary jennings. Its basically the life and times of an orphan during the sort of early viking midbarbarian period. Its a historic fiction pretty good. My favorite author regarding nonfiction is max blumenthal. I met him personally nice gentleman. His books have sort of a narrative that similar if you read fiction or if youre ever read anything not that sensational but that kind of nice pace. Its network and is probably one of the best authors regarding criticism of government insiders in the middle east. I highly recommend him to anybody. My favorite in depth guest is like asking a favor child but i would say my favorite is chris hedges. Great journalist, great author, love his show. I forgot the name now but he had a good interview show, and a close second is tom hartman. Both great men with a lot of knowledge. Host what do you do in chicago . Caller i worked as an election judge. I work in campaigns. Long story short i was studying engineering before trump got elected and when that happened i decided to do everything in my power to make trump a one term potus. I have dealt with a lot of advocacy. I worked on Chris Kennedys gubernatorial campaign. I worked with the gemma named fritz is a current tax assessor for the county. He beat the incumbent. Im a member of moms demand action, moms rising, although im not apparent in in respect and also member of a couple of individual chapters and most good due to groups i got involved in. When im not doing that im walking my dog about to commence the day which is why im 100 pounds lighter. Host i discuss in chicago. Thanks for your time. It was in 2021 of our fiction authors appeared and this is tom clancy. How often does an author come out with his first book and have a bestseller . I really dont know. I suppose its recently rare. Look, ill be the first person tell you i got extremely lucky. You want to hear the whole story of how it happened . The book came out and october of 1984. In november of that year, a gal well, and entered at the Washington Times at the post, the times, was retired marine colonel, since deceased unfortunately, and he wanted to get a copy of the book for his friends in argentina. He was too cheap to buy one for his pal. A certain lady was heading down, her name is nancy clark windows was one of his public theres people who really does know everybody. So i asked its name to take the book to argentina with her. Its a long flight from miami to buenos aires. She liked it. Anyway, Christmas Season. She c comes home and she buys a whole case the books, 28 copies to give out to her friends for christmas. One for friends was president reagan. President reagan would read two or three books a week when he was president. He liked the book and Start Talking it up around theg white house. A reporter with Time Magazine by the name of alexander heard the talk and decided to do a book about me in the book and the president and shazam, it made the bestseller list. It makes me please i voted for president reagan. Host that was tom clancy passed away i believe in 2013. In 2003 here three here the guests on in depth. Phyllis schlafly, martin gilbert, susan sontag, bernard lewis, harold bloom, noam chomsky, carlo deste, camille paglia, jeff shar, john keegan and Doug Brinkley were all our guests that year. Mike is in lakeside california. You are on booktv. Caller howre you doing . , how are you . Caller pretty good. I was just calling to recommend for our fellow citizens a couple books by gore vidal you had on a couple of times in various formats. The first one is imperial america, and the second one is dreaming war. I like the author and his writing style because its sort of a humvee comes from a sort of aristocratic political family so he has this bold world stoicism with his humor any kind of tells us the truth about a lot of unpleasant things without stoicism and the human and its a nice way to really get information. Host rb, new york city, you are on booktv. Caller good morning. I will start from the top with a book on a book that is wellwritten that is the biography of churchill by andrew roberts. And my favorite Nonfiction Book, invisibly into the two authors, is the wise men by evan thomas and Walter Isaacson. Now well get to the two authors. Both these gentlemen and i know each of them a little bit have written a eclectic and interesting books over the years since they wrote the wise men. The wise men i talk about all the time with people because the six subjects of the book had a a huge influence on American Foreign policy and only one of them was ever elected to office, and that was harriman. Host how do you know Walter Isaacson and evan thomas professionally, personally . Caller personally because my sister is an author as well. Host she has written about Queen Elizabeth. Caller yes. I belong to the athletic club. I do the Nonfiction Book events. South the course has been there as has evan thomas, thats right. Sally magill smith has written several books on english monarchy and other topics, and is well known to the booktv audience as well. Thank you for calling in. Vince was the prosecutor in the 1969 manson murder cases and is very famous book, crime book was helterskelter. He appeared on our program in 2007 and heres a little bit from that interview. Whodunit . Lee Harvey Oswald did. Absolute. You list at the end of this book all the conspiracy people who think its conspiracy. You list all the groups that could possibly be involved basically say the whole world wouldve had to conspire to kill president kennedy. If you listen to these conspiracy theres every president ial administration has been trying to cover up. You cannot believe oliver stone for instance, stones movie was one continuous lie. I have to qualify that. He had theor correct date, november 22, 1963, the correct victim, the correct city but other than that it was one continuous lie. He had his thinking cap turned very tightly to the opposite. At ten groups of involved or he thought was involved. He had them all involved. Even the kgb and cfe, bitter enemies but the gethe together n this one. They think the whole world is a ball. You asked me who did it. Let be summarized for use for Time Magazine a couple months ago. They gave me a page on oswald gill and then i get some rest for you if youre interested in why theres no conspiracy. If you gave to the individual conspiracy theories and you ask me about the kgb and at you and some other sayss what about castro come what about the rightwing . Ill try to summarize it for you. I learned as a prosecutor and you dont have to be prosecutor, common sense, that if you are innocent of a crime, chances are theres not going to be any evidence at all pointing torture gilbert why . Because you are innocent. But because of the nature of life, the unaccountability of certain things, now and then hes abundant will point. Geoa guilt even though your innocent. An extremely unusual rare situation maybe even two or three pieces of evidence, strong evidence, point toward your guilt even though your innocent. But in this case, because you asked meau whodunit, everything everythingve points towards lee Harvey Oswald gill. In the book i set forth 53 separate pieces of evidence pointing towards oswald gill. Under the circumstances it would not be humanly possible for oswald to be t innocent at least not in will and which we live. Doctor do now, you can hear me, it will be a dawn to more. Not in. Only in a fantasy world can you have 53 pieces of evidence pointing torture guilt and still be innocent. Host that was Vincent Bugliosi from 2007. 2007 picky passed away in 2015. In 2004 heres a list of guests. About 40 of those authors that we just showed you are still active and writing. Mike in gaithersburg, maryland, texas in my favorite in depth Author Interview was David Mccullough. As a former pittsburgh native it was special to hear about his career as an how he writes and approaches his subjects. Best wishes for another 20 years of in depth, mike in gaithersburg we appreciate that. In 2007 it was Newt Gingrich who was our author. Hes quite a prolific author. Hes written several books. This program, this section were going to show you from 2007 is a little different. We will explain it afterward. When you start over you with a soundbite and you gradually build up an inappropriate with a book with the dvd and i think in the continuum we are in one of those fascinating periods of dramatic change when we could potentially have an enormous dialogue in the country. I think something from second life we did. To give an example of how i see this stuff iss all going to evolve over the next five or ten years. For some of you the whole classes of an avatar will be new one lets watch and we can explain how this works. Let me just say that these are some of the teething pains of learning and new technology. I regard second voice and second life as the beginning of a a vy different kind of system. Thats exactly see happening in front of us which of people from all over the world can come together and can share ideas. And i think its very important to look at how this technology is going to evolve. Second life in many ways is the First Successful manifestation of an idea known as a as a met. The metaverse is a Virtual World inhabited by real people was pioneered in Science Fiction novels, theyll get since 1984 and 1992 snow crash of the first electoral treatment of the metaverse came in the form of 1992 book neural world. As a teacher by trade i am delighted to teach a workshop here in second life that im not the first to do so. Harvard Law School Professor charles taught a. Year inside second life about law and the court of Public Opinion andk i think youll find more people engaged in study groups and workgroups in this kind of second life and other kind of metaverse environments because they are so effective. Host that was 13 years ago, kind of an early version of an avatar. You can see how far technology has come in the last 13 years. Sarah, mississippi. Try to im calling from vicksburg mississippi. Host yes, maam. Caller peter, i look forward to watching cspan2 every weekend, and especially the first sunday of the month to see who the latest author will be. Well, ill tell you right now im reading host can you hit the mute on your tv . Were getting feedback. Caller im sorry. Here we go. All right. My Favorite Book of nonfiction is coming of age in mississippi by and moody. I think she wrote her memoir in 1968 and its the only book that i have read twice. My Favorite Book of fiction its son of solomon by Toni Morrison. Now, i know you had tony on several times but i dont recall you ever having anne moody on. You recall if she was ever on . Host no. Effort book came out in 1968 you say . Caller yes. Host chances are, booktv start in 1998 and perhaps she had passed by that time i was not active as a writer. Caller i think she passed maybe two years ago. I thought maybe you may have just had her on one of your shows, the producers looking up now but but i dont think anney does not ring a bell. We have limited as you know over the years, weve stayed with nonfiction. That wouldve been a very appropriate book given the title to have on. Caller its required reading here in mississippi for Junior High School students. Its a great book. Host are you teacher . Caller no, sir. Im just about a book person. I love books. Host what is sitting on your table right now, what book is sitting on your table . Caller okay. I have a lot of books sitting on my table but i just finished reading just us, claudia reagan. And im presently reading our president book citizen and american lyric. And i am also reading right now wandering in strange lands, a daughter of the great migration reclaims her roots by morgan jerkins. Ive seen her on your program. Host right. Claudia has been on as well recently. Caller i think she was on last week or the week before. Host did you pick up those books prior to seeing the month booktv or because of booktv . Caller i was a bookseller years ago but i still get the new york review of books, and also when i see new authors on your program and is an interesting, i will order. I believe in patronizing independent bookstores, and the one that is usually order my books from is square books in oxford, mississippi. Im sure youre familiar with them. Host i have been there. Caller i know you have, okay. But yes, but thats it for now. Host a lot of history in vicksburg, mississippi. Do you ever read any books, Historical Books about the civil war, especially the attack on vicksburg and the battles that happened there . Caller right now im trying to think of the authors name. I cant think of it right now. He did do a book on vicksburg. Is it hoffman, the gentleman who wrote mississippi in africa . Host theres another guy who just passed away. He also wrote forrest gump. He did a book on vicksburg. I i apologize, im blanking on disney but he just passed away recently. Caller i recall that now. Host he is written a the book on vicksburg as well. Thanks for your time this afternoon. We really appreciate it and thanks for watching. Janet, are you there . Delaware. Caller hello. Host you have to hit the volume on your tv. Turn it off trejo ive turned it down the volume, yes. Host all right. What are you reading . Who is your favorite author . Who have you enjoyed watching on tvs inDepth Program . Caller actually the book im presently reading is that the book im calling about. Im presently reading Isabel Wilkerson cast, but she doesnt address in this book, she did in the warmth of other suns the subject am really reading about it three of the books and thats the gato and wanted to mention my Favorite Books. Im africanamerican and and is born, im ed, born and lived in the gato intel is able to escape it because you have to escape the gato. But the first book that it read that really it was like a bible to me and explained to me the construction and persistence of the gato and that was a book that was written in 1993 by massey and denton, american apartheid in the making of the underclass. I will never forget one of the sentences, one of the statements they made in the book and it was, it was about when black people moved into predominantly white communities. Massey and denton said when that happens, white people must have somewhere that they can go where blacks cannot follow. After that happens, and i experienced it, the powers that be will make a community that you moved into, they will make that been a gato. Of the books i wanted to mention, the second one was written in 2009 by a professor at princeton university. She wrote a book called Family Properties and that really struck me in that book was the idea that when blacks, when the fda would not give, fha would not give blacks mortgages, we had to buy houses on contract, and the contract was held by a realtor or the owner of the house and the stipulations of the contract were such that you never could pay off the contract and so you lost the house and a solo to another black under the same kinds of circumstances. And then the third book is one written in 2016, gato, the invention of the place, the history of an idea, another princeton professor. Im particularly interested in the subject of the gato because i see it as a pillar of race in america, a pillar of race emblematic of the idea that the gato is where blacks belong, and they can only get out of the gato if we manage somehow for education or two opportunities we might be able to access. Those are the books. Host if youre reading cast, what is your comparison between warmth of other signs and cast . Caller in the warmth of other signs, Isabel Wilkerson talk to the gato. She talked a lot about the gato. In cast, and i just started reading it i dont like she talks about the gato so much in this book, the word gato is not in the index but she talks a lot about the gato, people made that great migration like records when he left that sharecroppinge former limitations of the south and the came north, even though initially blacks did not live in whats called the ghetto. Certainly by the 1940s they did. Host where do your parents begin their life and where did they end up and where were you raised . Where did your parents begin the life and where did they end up and where were you raised . Caller okay. I was born in chester, pennsylvania, and i lived in the projects which are no longer there. They were torn down i think about 20 years ago. The ghetto is where i lived until i was 16 when my parents managed to buy buy a house. My mother and father came from North Carolina and virginia. They had a fourth and an eighth grade education. The ghetto was a a place, it ws designated that we should live, and even to this day that pillar of race persists. Host janet in delaware, we appreciate your time this afternoon. Brian is in michigan. Caller good morning or good afternoon. Time change. I was reading woodward book and a half minute through it but hes using, the thing about bob woodward we know the history of him but he does the same thing thats going on a lot over the past decade or two, as all the socalled sources. And it really dont have sources. So i wonder how we allowed this to happen continually. Host have you read any of bob woodward 20 or so of the books treachery no. This is the first one. I seen him around for decades and, of course, we all know the history of him going all the way back. The thing of it is, getting back to this is, how do we keep allowing this to go on, guys like woodward and many others benefit, when you really dont have sources or like this anonymous works he served certy wasnt a highlevel source but yet we allow that to go on and they profit from him. You even see in the news all the time. Im just wondering when ever going to get back to real journalism instead of just calling people journalists . Shouldnt they have training in journalism . Shouldnt they understand the theory of journalism . Host what made you pick up this book, what made you pick up rage . Caller i kept seeing it so much and him profiting off of it i just had to go and had to take a look at it. And its the same thing they goes on, and i did, i dont want this to be about me but it works in naval intelligence. When i see things like this that so blatantly going on, i feel like im back in europe where they have blatant began to. Propaganda has entered into america. Thats what were dealing with now. Thats why were fighting all the time with each other. Because we are not making these writers, whether its woodward or many others, without having sources that they can verify and they can prove to you that they have verified them, they should not be able to cite these people. Its hurting our country. Host we are going to leave it there. In 2005, in depth was in its fifth year. Here were the authors. In 2013, a caller reference this author a little bit earlier, that mary roach was often very humorous enervating appeared on the program. Heres a portion of that. And i tried to find, because i didnt really care the den and space. I would have anybody done in zero gravity . I thought theres all those commercial flights, zero gravity flight, zero Gravity Corporation and called them and the guy said nasa is a contract of ours. If i cut out, we would lose a lot of money so no. He said no. But, of course, hes going to say no. Im guessing maybe one of the staff at the zero gravity core might have done that, after hours, flights, one of the earlier flight without working out the kinks, i dont know. But nobody is owning up to it. But your research on the topic included locating the porn star, correct . Silvia saint i believe, sylvia saint. There was supposedly, it was a trilogy called the uranus experiments, and what i heard was there was a scene shot in zero gravity, not in space but on a zero gravity simulator, its a plane that does the flights, your 20 seconds of zero gravity. Conceivably you could. I tracked down the producer of the uranus experiment who lives in spain, and we had a conversation about this and he said we did, we definitely did that shot in 0g. He said all sinned you a link to move and you can check it out. He went on and on and said i have a timeshare on a Corporate Jet and we got the pilot to do the flight. Really quite got a pilot to do zero gravity flight . Thats extreme. We had to check the plane really threw throw out what picture they were okay. Yet a lot of these and i thought okay. And then i downloaded the uranus experiments and iri fast voted, only person who fast forwarded through the porn to get to the scene of zero gravity. Right away if anything about zero gravity you can tell that this is fake because her ponytail is hanging down. Her ponytail is not, it would normally be like floating come zero gravity will be like this, it is hanging out in other parts of her anatomy are so utterly not in zero gravity. This should be no hanging down in zero gravity. Yeah, it would be no hanging down, and there was in the uranus experiment, evidence to all the redoing, the legs are hidden soldier standing behind a sofa going up and down like tried to look like they were one chuck them the money shot they kind off flipped it sidewas so it l looked like they were floating. Anyway. It was fake. Host that was mary roach in 2013. Tom is in palm harbor florida. What are you reading and who is your favorite author, david in depth guest . Caller my favorite author historian is howard zinn, and divert all all of his books, peoples histories of the United States, disobedience in democracy, student nonviolent coordinating committee. His first book was his phd thesis on governor la guardia in new york. Certainly a runnerup for great history books his recent guest jill lepore here ive read a couple of her books. I think its a fantastic book. Right nowe im reading the book that i dont know if he has been on, his name is larry tie, called demagogue. He has written many books. Ive written aks number of his books about a philip randolph. This book demagogue is about senator joe mccarthy. Its a fantasticic book. Host i think it just came out in the last month or two, didnt it . Caller yes, i believe we covered it always going to be on shortly, but yeah, thats one i think we have covered that. Caller hes also bit on interviewed on pbs news by judy woodward. Host right. But if you go too booktv. Org you can type in at the top of the page, theres a search function. Caller i do that all the time. Host if you type in his name it should appear. Im quite sure hes been on but thanks for watching and thanks for calling in. Curtis vancouver, washington. Caller hello pick one or two might use the name you are overlooking was forced gums author, winston grow. Host thank you. Caller 1942 1942 methods oe world, a lot of behind the scenes things going on in that. Host i had a chance to meet him once at the southern festival of books in nashville, just a very delightful person to meet. That was aso lot of fun. Caller i enjoyed your little clips of tom clancy. Have you ever had david hansen on . Host , yes. He has been on. What is it about mr. Hansen or doctor hansen that attracts you . Caller is in sight, his classical education and history from the greek and roman era. One of his books had what the impact was longterm of a particular battle, like the battle of were socrates managed to survive which had a big influence my history come for the battle of okinawa with the americans learned to be just as brutal as the japanese, or the battle of shiloh where the author had to backtrack back and forth, it was a part of the first that and made up for by writing the book been her. Host he is faced active, very active author and columnist. He has a weekly column and caller i look forward to seeing on tv come to, he was on our afterwards program golly, a couple months ago and book in support of President Trump he wrote so i do that does to your opinion. Caller yes, i concur. A couple books i recommend im currently reading, one is a biography of Samuel Fuller called a thirdph face which hasa lot of really very nice insight into his original career as a copy boy at the newspaper in new york, and then on to his career as a documentary and filmmaker. He was really very good at film new york and other is twilight of the gods. The war in the pacific, you are the second caller to recommend that. Caller a superb trilogy. Host and we have covered that as well. Caller the other one is james harms fish its also good on his pacific war books, and Rick Atkinson and his trilogy on the european war were really good. Favorite author going up was isaac, he has passed on a long time ago. For books tooo recommend, i got some books reading nero wolfe, murder mysteries and the way he kept his place in the book is a use a special bookmark. That was a book i went and looked up and read and that covers treasure of our tongue about the english language by lincoln barnett, and African Genesis about the development of humanity from primitive precivilization by robert artery who retired from writing scripts for movies picky wrote the book the script for cartoon but then he decided to specialize in researching anthropology. Host curtis, he seemed to spend a lot of time with books. You have a lot of free time or is this your hobby . Caller its just what i enjoy doing or anything is reading books. I had one whole room dedicated to a library i had to tear up because my daughter moved in with us for a while so the books are all box up in the garage, hobby 8000 books. Host thats a lot of books. Caller i have a fewav on hand reading like the third face phase and why the of the gods, and also wanted to recommend for the civil war buffs the trilogy about u. S. Grant, starting with campton same grant byyd lloyd lewis who passed away after taking all the notes and parading the book and he passed it all on to a subsequent biographer, bruce, who everybody in civil warwa knows him. There was one great anecdote when grant came back from vancouver. He had a time at the post here where he was not very happy because his family was way and he came back to galena, illinois, and one day he came into the store, galena, in the middle of a rainstorm, one of the guys sitting around the potbelly stove was very prominent local boy who said what, you look like hell. And grant says come i sure feel like a turkey says, the guy at the stuffs it whats it like . Grant says same as here. Lawyers closest to the fire. Host curtis, are you a lawyer by profession . Caller no, no. Im an Aerospace Engineer who kind transitioned with the peace dividend into education. Right now im a substitute schoolteacher semi retired and a lot of time to read books. Host we appreciate your time on tv today. Carolyn in sac city iowa is reading janet con eds books. Theres a couple 90 east park place, Robert Oppenheimer and loss almost and the regulators, and the british spy circle in washington. Janet has appeared u on tv sevel times and you can watch it online. Glint is in texas. Caller i wanted to call attention to the book grant by ron chernow as well as his book on alexander hamilton. I mean, a lot of people today dont like books that are that long. Ion mean, but i find his books hard to put down once you start. Well done, so well documented. I really appreciate that because in the current climate of people playing sort of fast and loose with information. The other writer that i really enjoyed enjoy it and would recommend to anybody is richard burr kaiser and his most recent book to be liberty, its an excellent thing for people to read right now. It goes back to a time that is been under attack and follows the real origins of the founders early release. Its not a long book. But it is so worth your time. Host thank you for calling in, glint in humble, texas. Mr. Brooke kaiser has appeared on booktv several times. In fact, a year or so back we did an interview with the historian Richard Kaiser walser writes for National Review and his wife whos a psychotherapist. She had written a book called basically how to get along with your friends and neighborsok politically, if you dont agree on politics. We interviewed them in their apartment in new york and you can watch n that online at book. It was in 2002 on one of his many appearances on booktv and cspanan that this gentleman appeared on in depth. Heres a portion. As i matured it was really Anton Chekhov and John Coltrane. They seem to be here and here. Here. How did the intersect. Was in you listen to John Coltrane a love supreme brings together the spirituality and genuine doubting, the spirituality and genuine giving and serving, its that socratic questioning and that profound love compassion, loving kindness you get out of the rich judaic tradition and the christian tradition, that is brought together in coal train. He takes it high level in terms of his musical genius and with coltrane in the check off you simply not have a poet in prose of such profound compassion wrestling with death, disappointment come wrestling with the steady ink of misery, the constant heartbreak of daily life, trying to convince us to keep on. It is not our business, t. S. Eliot said. Thats checkoff. And its blues really. How would you keep keeping on . Been down so long, long and woo more, thats why keep keeping on. Frost, wonderful poem, not all there. He says late at night and still im losing but feel i am steady and an accusing, pushing no matter what. Thats profoundly jacobian with the level of compassion and love that you just dont find into me as an artist. You have to go to thomas hardy or Toni Morrison to get that fusion of sweetness of mind and toughness of temper in one figure. When did you find him . I first read him when i was 17. It blew my mind. Host and 18 18 years later joining us now is doctor cornel west. Dr. West, listening to that is anything you would like to add . Caller i just was want to congratulate you,ha my brother. What a force for good jump in. What a force for good 20 years cspan has been in the midst of very, very grim in so many ways bleak time. You all the been a light picky been so kind to me and so many other voices as well, my dear brother. I hope your loved ones are strong and help hope that our r im blessed to be breathing. Each breath is a breakthrough picked each day is a blessing, my brother. Almost 20 years later but im still tied to checkoff. Still tied to coltrane and still revolutionary christian high to a Palestinian Jew named jesus. You up to youve written snowi dont even count. Guess maybe 20, 21, Something Like that. But its not as you know a matter of the quantity, its a matter of the quality of the words on the page and you hope those words can help its the quality of the words on the page and you hope that it can help settle some minds and heal some hearts in the best way that we can and in the actions that we do the finite lines that we live. Host are you working on a book now . Ive got different lectures in scotland coming and its on catastrophe, ka fast fee and public intellectuals. Beginning with the man whose parents died in the bubonic plague and they made his way through the various mon stair monestrarees, and goes to tony morrison, to the edwards, and the reverends and sontags, and culminating with tony mayor son and some cold train, too, and its in the making, ive got about two years to work on these lectures, so thats going to be the next big book, at the moment were just trying to get through the election and see if theres any democracy going to be left. Ive been reading ag hopkins book, american empire global history, a professor at university of cambridge and the treatment of the american empire in decline, military overreach, corruption of elites. Not just republicans, but elites across the board and the feeling among everyday people that they dont have the kind of power required to turn this thing around. We hope were not on the titanic or mel villes and the confidence man, all of those ships that just was going under because we lost access to the best of our past, unable to mobilize the kind of resources and sources. Spiritual, moral as well as political and civic that can keep a very fragile experiment in democracy alive. I think thats where we are now, my brother. Thats where we are now. But thank god the life of the mind is still at work, cspan, life of the mind is indispensable. Its all insufficient because we have to have courageous citizens and loving human beings, but its indispensible, all of us in some ways that were laboring under certain frameworks, certain lens through which we look through the world and that comes freotte poets, that comes from thinkers, that comes from writers, shelly is right the poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world, he says. Unapprehended inspiration. The mirrors of the shadows of the future cast on the present. And the young brilliant one writes before he died, 29 years old. And appropriating dante and the triumph life in the last great poem. He understood we have to be connected with our past through our ideas, our visions, our stories, our narratives, my brother to intervene on the present. And focus on the working poor, and around the world all colors, all genders, all sexual orientations. And for me, it begins with the genius of hebrew scripture and when i talked about years ago, the loving and kindness and followers and widows and orphans, person rendered invisible, thats the covenant that god makes with israel, with jews. And its set the standard for everybody, including israel, including jews. What are you doing for the least of thee . What are you doing through your poor is this what are you doing to those who are dominated and occupied and its the moral and spiritual standard greater than all of us and no one of us ever possessed that kind of truth that we could be in quest with that kind of truth and i know what you can relate to me, brother peter, with your own family, your intellectual humility in socrates, or in a weeping jeremiah or weeping jesus or deeply concerned mohammad trying to bring together different people than medina, at each others throats and hes trying to get to peace a mercy required beyond justice. Absolutely. And its hard to believe though, 18 years later, you know what i mean, my soul looks back and wonders how blessed i am still to be alive. Three years ago, you were in in depth again, i dont know if you remember that. Oh, with brother robbie, brother robbie. Robby george, absolutely, thats the truth. So, we had a great time. We didnt have a book though. I think we, we had maybe jointly written reflections on truth seeking at that time, that we had put out. We put out another one honestly and courage just recently, but, you know, we had a magnificent time on your show, man. We were trying to hold up to the best of our ability the bloodstained banner of integrity, decency, generosity to others, even anytime you talk about your idea, racial identity, gender identity, whatever you have, it has to be rooted in integrity and solidarity with those across various nations and colors. And the moral spiritual standards that we all fall short of, but the moral and spiritual standards must be highlighted or end up with massive spiritual decray and decre decreppitude and thats part of what were dealing with. Host just to tell our audience, Robert George is a professor at princeton and author and one of cornell wests best friends and he happens to fall on the conservative side of the political speck um interest spectrum . Is that a Fair Assessment . Thats a clear assessment, and we have a love thats not reducible to politics, we have a deep profiled friendship in brotherhood not to agreement on public policy, but its just acknowledgment how we can revel in each others humanity even when we have very deep political disagreements and thats also an understanding of, you know, the difference between deep love and narrow justice. Any justice thats only justice soon degenerates into something less than justice if its not grounded in something more profound than justice. Thats right, hes right about that, but you can love somebody and also have very deep political disagreements. But if its only about justice and end up living in your own silo and youre unable to really make the humane and human contact with folk, that you have disagreements with. And we always we already understand this in terms of our own families, you know what i mean . Thanksgiving dinner sit around the table and you love folk like i dont know what, but youve got some disagreements, and even with moms and dads and brothers and sisters and take a bullet for them. And thats the love that undergirds any serious talk about justice and it doesnt mean that we dont have political foes, of course, we do. Theres no doubt about it that donald trump for me is a political foe, no doubt about that, but i dont want to lose sight of his humanity and i dont want to lose sight hes made in the image of god and im made in the image of god. If he did not consent to his gangster like activity and change his life and acted with integrity, he has that capacity, he could do it if he really wanted to, but he chooses not to. As long as that image of god in persons and as long as that choice that we have to be different, to go another way, to be better, you dont ever want to lose sight of that. When youre engaging human beings. And in the Baptist Church that you hate the sin, but you can try and stay in contact with the humanity of the sinner. And if, in fact, you know, as i also learned at shiloh Baptist Church, the kingdom of god is within you in everywhere you go, you all leave a Little Heaven behind. The and the question becomes, what kind of heaven behind are we really leaving in terms of our relations with others, our concerns with poor people and working people. Our concerns about Indigenous Peoples and poor white people and our concern with those in latvia, somalia, ethiopia, nigeria, thailand, japan, got to be global, its got to be international. Thats part of the greatness of the prophetic legacy of jerusalem, that every flag for christians ought to be under a cross. Every flag for jews ought to be under the unnameable way, but the god of justice, justice thou shall pursue. Not just for the group, not just for the eagle, for all of those who suffer, these are some of the grit moral truths of the species if we lose sight of that, we end up losing the planet, we end up losing american democracy, we end up losing the best of ourselves. Gino probably wrote the greatest play about america, the iceman cometh, what does it profit the thats his literary good to see you in person and thank you for your time on in depth today. Congratulations, brother, stay strong. Byebye. And this text message from leslie in pittsburgh, favorite guest was Colson Whitehead on our sixth year in fiction in 2018. We did a 12 fiction authors and Colson Whitehead was our guest, one of our guests. Well, it was in 2006 that our guests were ron powers, taylor brandt, francis fukiama, mark bowden, larry gallagher, tammy bruce, John Hope Franklin, ray kerrswhile and president jimmy carter. It was in march that francis was on in 2006 and here is a portion. So youre also interested in photography . Well, thats actually been a much more longstanding hobby of mine that i started when i was a kid and i gave it up for about maybe 15, 20 years, but then the digital age hit and ive been doing it now, i think for about 10. I travel a lot, so i always take the camera wherever i go, but i got interested in, you know, being an i believe to control lighting and doing more studio type work and so ive now gotten set up i have this annual ritual with my kid. I did a portrait of them every year so that we have a very clear record of what they looked like at yearly implant values and one of these days i would like to take pictures of all of my friends because i know some pretty interesting people and i get them to pose in front of my camera, but unfortunately ive been a little too busy to do that. Is this where you do your portrait work right here . Yeah, its just a basement, but, i can set it up with all of my lights to do portraits. Host what kind of camera . I love this camera. It is an rz67, a medium format. It produces a big 6 by 7 negative. And its bigger and produces the most beautiful High Resolution picture that i scan into the computer. It produces about 500 megabyte scan when youre done with it, ive taken it to australia and its not an easy camera to use, but it produces ip credibly beautiful pictures. How long have you been using this . About four years. Ive got another medium format thats lighter that i use for travel photography, but in that ive got a collection of nikons and other things. Im afraid the Digital Resolution is finally going to make these cameras obsolete because the resolution you can get now on a pro digital slr is getting up to this level. But im going to be very sad because the films that they make for medium format cameras are just beautiful, just at the moment that theyve perfected it, all of thats going to end. How does the processing work . You just get a negative and then you manipulate the digital . Yeah, i scan it, ive got a medium format scanner so i scan a slide or a negative and then you photo shop from there. And as a kid i did black and white and even color dark room work and the computer makes that so much easier these days. You feel kind of bad, all of these skills that people developed to, you know, dark room skills like ansell adams. Theres one print that ansell adams printed repeatedly and it took him 25 years to finally get the print that he felt happy with. And unfortunately, you know, its easier, all of that effort and, you know, that craftsmanship, you lose when you move to computers and digital. In one of Francis Fukuyamas books, hes still writing. That was a visit out to his house. And richard hall of cspan did that for many years, traveled to authors homes and well show you more as we go. Tarik in tucson, thanks for holding, youre on book tv. Favorite book, Nonfiction Author, what are you reading . Have you had a favorite in depth guest . Well, my favorite of all time is ought biography of malcolm x. I read that as a kid 9 or 10 years old. My First Library book that inspired me to read, but listening to cspan, and just the wonderful authors youve had across the board, you know, i have a very diverse background of reading by my career has been education. Ive been in education, this is my 40th year, and ive been assistant principal for 22 years, and it really moved me when you were talking to the lady of delaware, im originally from delaware and played football for university of idaho and ended up in tucson. And talking about the ghetto, im reading the color of law, and it was interesting, talking about the things that she was talking about. I had the pleasure of meeting dr. Cornel west, and working in my School District in the africanamerican studies department and i was selected to ask him a question and i was reading the book democracy matters, one of my Favorite Books and dr. West was trying to get me inspired to go to princeton to finish my doctorate and never finished. Reading a book one of your favorites beginning again by professor eddie claude, a princeton guy and dabbling in that. One of my favorite historian, president ial historian professor meekin, one of my favorites, so ive got to kind a crosssection of things and one of the things i like about cornel west is how he talks about some of the news today as a form of entertainment. You know, that they present. You know, you just have to read between the lines. But all the people you had on today, i admire everyone that you had on that are deep readers and i think one thing about cspan, im so glad that you have this program because it gives us a chance to broaden our horizons intellectually. One of the people you had on before was a book by Michelle Sullivan looking up. I read her book. Im reading a new book, finding latina, in search of the voices, redefining latino identity. And so, im reading her book. So i go back and forth, i think one of my favorite people you had on also was dr. Mike dyson, i have several of his books and so i enjoy that kind of reading, too. So, yes, with cornel west, its what you see is what you get with him. Oh, yesments yes. Host so hes been consistent over the years. I tell you, tarik, we missed going down to sue son for that wonderful book festival put on at the university of arizona this year. Have you been to that in the past . Oh yes. Oh, yes, i go every year and pick up a couple of books. Host yeah, weve covered it for the past 10 years or so and of course, this year, it didnt happen, but we look forward to going back down. March is a nice time to be in tucson after a long winter, too. So it is, it is, its a beautiful place. Host yeah, tarik, thanks for your time. We sure appreciate it. Well, as tarik mentioned a couple of historians. Another historian who appeared and is still working today, this is from 2001. And this is best selling author and Pulitzer Prize winner david mccollough. Weve got some video of your home and your writing shed, where is it . Well, its, first of all, its not a shed. I mean, its the real headquarters. Whats that . Thats our home, thats on music street in west tewkesbury, massachusetts, a village in the center of the island of Marthas Vineyard and houses part of its 18th century, 19th century, 20th century, thats the back porch looking over the acre that we own where we have gardens and a nice reach back to the bordering on to a neighboring farm which has been the same family since the island was first settled. And this is my, in effect, my walk to work. Thats where i work right there, that measures 12 by 8 feet. Has windows on all four sides. I absolutely love it. It has about 800 books in there and my faithful typewriter upon which i have worked now since about 1965. Ive written every book ive ever written on that old royal typewriter and theres nothing wrong with it. Its an example of a beautifully made american machine. It probably got 750,000 miles on it. It runs perfectly. Have you written every word on john adam in this room . Yes. Part of it in charlotteville i was doing research at the library at university of virginia. But essentially, all of it was written here in that room. What kind of day to you write . I work all day every day. Im not writing all day, but reading or correcting what i wrote before or going over notes, theres no phone, theres no telephone there. Is there music. No music, no. Theres a nice view, but i have my back to the view so i wont be tempted by it. Its far enough from the outs, there you see general washington, and some of his soldiers marching along. I hope they show that the end of it. Because theres a guy at the end that i identify with. Hes the one thats always a little slow catching up. Hes not quite were going to see him and i look at him and hes my hes my example, there we there he is thats the one . [laughter] hes always a little behind. Well, David Mccullough is published by Simon Schuster and the ceo of Simon Schuster is on the screen. What does may have had mccullough meant to s s. Its the franchise. He fills me with such admiration. If david is watching, david, we revere you, we love you and we will be reading you forever. I mean, hes hes been with s s over 50 years and hes one of the great writers at work today. The and you know, every time ive had the privilege of reading one of his manuscripts, the thing that struck me the most is its not just wasted words. Hes such a careful writer and also, the way hes able to find the inspiration in American History is distinct tiivdistinc i dont think theres anybody quite like david. Can you tell us is he writing a new book right now . I hope so. You have to ask his editor, i sure hope so. Have you been to his shed . I have not been to his shed, no. In fact, hes hard to reach on the telephone. As you said in that interview, he doesnt answer the phone. So, 20 years in depth has been on the air. Doris kearnes goodwin, peggy noonen, bob woodward, david klein, all Simon Schuster authors who appeared on the program. How has the world of publishing in the last 20 years changed . And you only have two minutes to answer that question. Well, first of all, a lot of those authors are still around and still writing best sellers. And writing books that are having a lot of influence. Obviously, bob woodward for ages. Has it a tremendous impact, i think, on the way that people are perceiving this president ial campaign, but i guess, the short answer is that i think theres obviously more books being sold online. I think that the pace of publishing just like the news cycle has accelerated. And i guess the third thing i would say is that i think that maybe the nonfiction culture, in recent years, has perhaps taken a little bit of attention away from fiction. So those are the big points i would say. So when you planned Bob Woodwards most recent book, rage, and you talked about the timing, what went into that decision to release it in Early September . Well, we thought that that was when attention would be the most focused on the questions of how the Trump Administration has behaved and conducted itself. But a lot of it also depend upon bobs reporting and his own timing and his own schedule. Although wed hoped the book would be published in september. We werent sure. And bob kept saying, it could be earlier, it could be later and the reporting is what determined the schedule. So although wed hoped it would be september. Nothing was certain until bob was done. When bob was done, we moved. Whats been the effect of the pandemic on the publishing industry, specifically Simon Schuster . Well, its been unusual because for several months we actually didnt publish that many books. When the pandemic began in march, we postponed several titles that were coming out in april, may, june, and then we started to publish more, really going into july and so, and then ultimately book sales were up. I mean, the industry, book seattles have been up about 6 industrywide for the major publishers and people were home and they had time to read. So its turned out to be in through the hardship and through all the suffering for readers, it been all right. Now, jonathan cakarp, two wellknown in publishing figures have passed, Allison Mayhew and reading its been a tragic year for people in the Book Publishing industry, theyre not the only ones who died and just the other day, i mean, its you know, there are a lot of major people who passed away this year. Carolyn was our ceo and worked at Simon Schuster for decade, was a great leader. Alice was one of the greatest editors of our time and really one of the leading editors of nonfiction and was Bob Woodwards editor and doris kearns good win s editor and she was working until her final days and she called me and wanted to sign up two more books. Her work was her life and she loved her authors and she made an immense contribution to publishing, as did carolyn. Did alice mayhew leave a manuscript behind . Thats the book everyone would like to read. Alice was a deeply private person, but we did publish a book about alice. We asked a bunch of her authors to contribute memories of her and we published that and i think its available free to the public. And its a wonderful its a wonderful book of memories and it was reviewed quite favorably by the Washington Post nlt mr. Karp, what books are coming out by Simon Schuster this Christmas Season that we should be alerted to . Since you asked, i dont know if you can see this, the luckiest man by mark shalter, an account of his years working with john mccain and i was in tears by the end of this book. Its the story that you wouldnt really be able to get any other way. Mark was senator mccains chief of staff for many years, worked with him on his president ial campaigns, was his chief speech writer and coauthored seven books with him. So youre seeing mccain from the most intimate perspective that any politician or political leader could be seen from, and its a story, even if you dont agree with mccains politics, this was an honorable man, and a man who cared deeply about the country and i think that its a story that recordless of your political ideology, you can appreciate. So thats one. I think that other books that we have for the holidays, jonathan alters, biography of jimmy carter, his very best, which is a terrific account of president carters life and took jonathan about six years to write. We have a book that just came out on joe biden, evan won the National Book award for his first book on china. Hes the new yorker staff writer and hes gotten to cover hes been covering biden for many years and we think that this will be we hope it will be the book that everybody turns to it understand joe biden. Jonathan karp. President and ceo of Simon Schuster. By the way, a couple of years ago, book tv went into the Headquarters Building in Simon Schuster and did a tour. If youd like to watch that, type in Jonathan Karp in the search function at the top of book tv. Org. Thanks for spending a few minutes with us, mr. Karp. Thank you. Host in 2007 upon book tvs in Depth Program these authors appeared. P. J. Orourke, havevanessa suiz michael o wilson, christopher hitchen, david horowitz. Vincent bugliosi and Newt Gingrich. Good afternoon, who are you reading and who is your favorite who is an author youd like to recommend . First of all, compliment on book tv, i only find it the last couple of years and i find it very, very interesting and educational. Ive been promoting it to other people and talking to fine educated people and i tell them how, also, your authors compliment librarians. I have a couple of buddies, that are librarians. And the authors say they couldnt achieve the books without the assistance of some of you librarians and another fellow from rutgers, playing from the situation also. I want to answer your question, also, and i have a number of your authors that ive listened to and ive listened to with intensity and ill lead off by telling you, i enjoy the replay that you had of William F Buckley, im sure you remember that one. That was a really phenomenal interview, and whose books, wrote so many books and 41 you said and how can you beat that . I enjoyed listening to dr. Who wrote the fractured the republic. And i thought that was interesting. Most people think its a great debate, who theyre thinking about, lincoln and douglas and you cant forget thomas payne and edmund burke. And i also want to mention that dr. Ross, who was on just a few minutes ago, i really wanted to talk to him. I think hes a very welleducated man and i really enjoyed his presentation of some of the thoughts he wanted to convey to us. I like tom wolf, charlotte s simmo simmons. That was fascinating. Tom was an interesting guy and i think you enjoyed having him as a guest and he went on College Campuses to observe behavior of students and whats going on on College Campuses today, you fortunately did go away to duke to college and back in the 70s, boy, things have changed and interesting hearing the view of tom wolf. I think hes very fascinating and a wonderful write. Host and what do you do in pittsfield, massachusetts . What do i do here . Sure, glad to answer that question. After college i ended up getting a degree in socialology and i worked for the commonwealth of massachusetts as employment counselor for years and i also got involved, my family has a Small Business and i did some retail work with them. And ive lectured at a college campus, lectured to a clergy, lectured at the house of correction and involved in Community Service and thats why some of the your information gives me great background when i talk to other people. One question i want to ask you, peter if you dont mind trying to answer this one. I hope your listeners will probably get something out of this, aid he liao im like to hear your do you find a central theme through the authors you had, variety. But i also would like to say a number of your authors seemed to emphasize the point of, theres been a decline in our morality in this country and i think thats part of the cause for this that goes back to your fractured republic. I think that part of the problem is that our country would improve its morality, maybe more people would get into the secular life, it would cause less of a pluralism going on in our Society Today which i think most of some of your authors refer to really a problem that we may have to face in the future. Host and thats dan in pittsfield, massachusetts. Bob from detroit texted in that in depth should go back to three hours. Thats why its called in depth. Its now this last year, i think, weve put it down to two hours. So. 2027488210 for those of you in mountain and pacific and if you want to text in a thought, include your first name and your city, and mike is in needham. Youre on book tv, please go ahead. Good afternoon, i would just like like to mention probably the greatest Nonfiction Book written, the author is long gone, the history the tunisian war and probably the greatest nonfiction. The most important fiction book ive ever read was 1984, you can read that book and you can just see whats going on today, and its just the most important book i ever read. Authors i would you had paul johnson on, who is a very influential with me and finally, thomas soul, i dont know if youve ever had him on, but he is just fantastic and hes written like 40 books or Something Like that. Yeah, paul johnson joined us and i remember that interview you. We appreciate you calling in. Well, it was in 2009 that a woman named Temple Grandon appeared. Shes somebody with autism who designs livestock holder, and very big best selling author and here is just a portion of what Temple Grandin had to say. What do you mean when you say you think in pictures . Well, all of my thoughts come up as pictures. Its sort of like google for images. Instead of asking me an abstract question of thinking in picture and i see the cover of my book. Why dont you pretend im google images, dont give me house or car, most people can vishize that or something i could see in the studio, just give me a noun and ill tell you how my mind searches the data base. Cspan. Cspan, im seeing my hotel room, ive got the it. V on this morning and i was watching cspan, but the tv wouldnt turn off and i had work to do and i see the Remote Control and how i got from cspan to tv Remote Control and i had to call the desk to get the Remote Control to work and now im into the hotel hassle file. Corral. Corral, im starting to see many of the facilities that ive signed. And you know, they start coming up like slides, corral tends to be ranch facilities so im seeing ranch facilities, youd ask me, you know, feed lot facilities and see things i designed in the feed lot. If you said meat plant i see facilities ive signed at the meat plant and since thats something thats my business, im going to tend to see my own stuff. Why dont you ask me something that would not be my business . Book. Im seeing them, theyre in the room. Youre not being very creative in what youre asking me. I didnt know i was going to be put on the spot. The only way i can explain to you how i think, is ive got to show you how its socialive thinking, and on the internet, word based search and first two words are on the subject and gradually off the subject. Its associative. How many people are like this. Some are Graphic Design art people. When i design a piece of equipment in a drawing, i can actually test run it in my head like a Virtual Reality computer system. And i thought every other designer could do that and they couldnt. When i wrote thinking of picture i interviewed people how they think and shocked to find out most other people dont think the way i do. Like for example, i say think about a Church Steeple, i see specific ones, where theyre located. And put them in the Church Steeple file. They have a vague generalized image, i only have specific ones. That was Temple Grandin 2009 on book tv. This is lisa in toms river, new jersey, i just finished reading from octavia butler. It was recommended in the Facebook College alumni group and was wellwritten and i recommend it. And benjamin, good afternoon, what is on your reading list and who is your favorite in depth author. My favorite author is i dont know if youve read him or what has he written . Well, my Favorite Book of his is called the first and the last freedom hes been written about by august huxley and huxleys statement about his writing is that the reader will find a clear contemporary statement of the fundamental human problem, problem singular, together with an invitation to solve it in the only way in which it can be solved by and for himself. He looks at the fundamental problems as basically greed, fear, and the search for security. And spell his last name for us, please, benjamin. His last name is krishnamurti. Krishnamurti. Yes. Thank you, in ames, iowa go ahead. Im ed from ames and i read is book not long ago as a result of cspan i dont think it was book tv. I think it was a q a with brian lamb, and it was called clandestine relationships, a black mans odyssey in the ku klux klan, and it was very illuminating book written, i think, 1998. So im not so sure you may have interviewed him on book tv, but its a very interesting book that i had called ignorance there are two kinds of men, those who are ignorant and those who are stupid and he goes on to relate that people who are ignorant tend to do stupid things, but it was a very illuminating book and i enjoyed it and it was amazing how a black man was able to become very Close Friends with members of the ku klux klan to the point where they not trusted each other, but they became very, very Close Friends at which point at the end of the book, he realizes that his best friend in the ku klux klan has a daughter and he wants darryl davis to become his daughters godfather. Host thank you, ed in ames, iowa. Andy in macon, georgia. Andy, go ahead, please. Yes, to ena your questions on my favorite norrauthors, got be David Mccullough and goodwin. The reason i like mccullough, he was one of the first to put you there. And i am he in my 60s, and i remember a show walter cronkite, you are there. And mccullough talking about a revolutionary soldiers and how you get home. Or what kind of care you get, put on your shoes, did you have matching shoes and he was one of the first to introduce me to that line of thought and ive used that so far to tailor my reading list. My reading list, rick adkinsons trilogy. And finished Victor David Hanson and heard somebody talk about the polynesian war and hanson was the first to make it interesting and i read it on war like no other and i heard it on your a replay of the book tv. I wouldnt call myself like a cspan groupie, i dont sit up at 3 30 at night and watch cspan, but all of my friends are probably tired of me telling them that they ought to flip over to cspan every now and again. Ive downloaded your 3 ps. Im going to go ahead and go out on a limb and say you are a groupie. Well, you know, i will say this, you have changed, youve made me feel better about this years election. Basically, from the contenders that you all just played or the, you know, the other one, the president s and first ladies and landmark cases and stuff, you know, i kind of consider myself studying history though im in an engineer working in defense department, but basically, there was always some big issue for every year, you know, every election, al smith back in the 1920s and you know, the dewey and every year theres always been some big deal and if youre only to listen to the propaganda out there today on other channels, you wouldnt get that picture and so, im kind of thinking that, o even though this is a big election, trump and biden, whoever wins or loses, i believe as long as the machinery of our system stays in place, well be okay. And i have cspan to thank for that. Host well, andy, thank you for calling in and watching. Over the years from the publisher regnary. Authors. Michelle malkin, Newt Gingrich, mark stein and others, what do they have in common . I think its fair to say thatter this conservative, everything including this gentleman in our first year. Old and musty, this is what, 49 years old. Yeah, came out in 1951. It was rather amusing ly that calculated on the 250e anniversary of the founding of yale. In fact, that was coincidental. The picture on the back of those, do you remember those days . [laughter] no, not conceivably. Host whats in the book . Well, the book was an examination of life at yale for the undergraduate with special attention given to the impulses in the courses to which he was exposed having to do with government, the enthusiasm was greater government or was it enthusiasm was lesser Less Government and also, in respect of religion. And what was encouraged in those courses in way religion touched. Faith or skepticism . And i concluded that in those days, it was a collectivist impulses and agnostic in respect to the other. So i rattle on or do you want to. [laughter] i was going to say as recently as four years ago at a reunion, someone who is our minister, became the minister reminded me that i had volunteered to read allowed the section that bore on christianity to dwight whitehall. And i regret to tell you that everything you said was proved correct, of which he meant that the gradual sort of appearance of the strong Christian Faith was accurately predicted in on the basis of his knowledge of what went on. Host William F Buckley was publish published by regry and the now publisher, how long have you been on the job. Since january of this year, ive just completed 10 months. Host what were you doing prior to that . I was an editor from 2012 until this year. So, we have two levels of editors, basically, we have senior editors or lead editors who take the raw manuscript, work on developing a book and do the big picture editing and then we have copy editors who take it from there. So i was one of the senior editors at regnery. Host i think on a visit, i picked up a copy of god and man at yale by William F Buckley. Oh, good for you. Host whats he meant to the company . Buckley . Yes. A lot. That was well, that book really, he and regnery started the company in 1947 and we just heard in that interview clip that was published in 1951. God and man at yale, and another important book in the conservative intellectual tradition that Henry Regnery published, the conservative mind, appeared roughly the same time early in the life of the company and those two books put regnery on the map and really established the tradition that we try to kaur carry on to this day. So, who are some of the authors that have been published this year. What kind of authors do you publish at regnery . Its quite a variety. We have we usually have some big name conservative figures. Youve mentioned, you know, desouza, ann coulter and those people. Desouza having been a classmate of mine at dartmouth college. We have politicians, so our current best selling book is called one vote away by senator ted cruz. Its about the Supreme Court. That came out right at the same time as another book on the Supreme Court from regnery, called supreme disorder, another type of author, a conservative intellectual and we have lots of those. We have another book by a another academic, canadian called the parasitic mind he is a youtube and podcast celebrity. And we have books by, you know, quiet quieter types, quieter writers. One that just came out a couple of weeks ago is called the price of panic its about the pandemic, the response the governments response to the pandemic by three scholars, jay richards, douglas ax and william briggs, sort of the economist emphas economist emphasis a statistician and biologist. We cover the spectrum. Host Thomas Spence, from regnery better to have a democratic, or a republican when it comes to book sales . Thats a good question. The joke at regnery what is bad for america is good for regnery, from a conservative point of view. The clinton years were very good for regnery. When a conservative is in the white house, its our people in our market are a little less worked up about things maybe. So, generally being in the opposition has been good for regnery. The trump years, everything about donald trump has, you know, breaks the mold so weve done pretty well into the trump years just because i suppose he stirs the pot. Theres plenty for people to read about and talk about, but in general, in general, you know, the opposition years are good for our business. Host Thomas Spence is the new ceo and publisher of r regnery. Thanks for spending time on in depth. Congratulations on 20 years. Host thank you, sir. Thomas from california, youre on the air, tell us your favorite author, your Favorite Program or what youre reading. Im a big fan of book tv might be my Favorite Program and id like to answer favorite Nonfiction Author and Favorite Book tv guest. First on the Nonfiction Author, thanks to the caller a few minutes ago, i also am a fan of jay krishnamurti. And another important author still living, but i dont think he has been on book tv yet. I would like to see him. Ken wilbur. Host what did he write about . He writes about the spectrum of consciousness, consciousness development. Integral theory, integrated paradigms. Developmental paradigms and hes been called americas greatest living philosopher. Hes been talked about by the likes of like bill clinton, as far as his importance, so ken wilbur. Host thank you, sir for calling in. Well, it was in 2004 and a couple of viewers have brought up tom wolf, that he was on the program. Here is a portion. I decide to do the white suit and the hats and all that for purposes of the what happens with the public city. Its happened by accident, but i realized soon that i was on to a good thing. Id just come i finally got my job in new york on a paper, the Washington Post. And finally got the job in june of 1962. Summer was coming on and in those days the reporter had to wear a jacket and a tie. And today reporters look like theyre all waiting in the soup kitchen line, but then you had to have and i had only two jackets to my name. So i went into a store and i bought a white suit for the summer, which in richmond, virginia where i grew up, was not an odd it was not an odd thing, but it was made of some heavy material, some tweed, and i couldnt wear it in the summer so i started wearing it about this time of year, conventionally cut, but it was white. And this annoyed people to no end. Why i enjoyed that, i dont know. But it made getting dressed in the morning a lot more fun than it had been and finally i wrote a book, or rather, i published a collection, tangerine line, magazine pieces id done and i discovered im not used to being interviewed. I was always interviewing somebody else and i was kind of speechless and people asked me questions and my opinions and stuff and i really didnt say very much, but all the articles would say, what an interesting man, he wears white suits so it took the place of a personality for many years. Host how many of them do you have . I used to have a lot of them. Ive got about 22 now. I can get by with that. Host how long can you wear them without having to have them cleaned . About six hours. When if you go on a trip and many people think you have one, you have to have three, and i have three suits i brought along to come here, all made of the same material, you cant really tell the difference, but you know, it really it simply has not hurt to have a trademark. Host and mr. Wolfe passed an i with an i passed away in 2018. And here are guests, michael eric dyson, alice walker, ralph peters, john wilson and Jonathan Karp talking about the election that year. And steven pinker, and kevin phillips, well, it was in may that book tv went to alice walkers home in the Berkley Hills and did the program from there. And about bob marley, ive never met bob marley while he was alive and i feel though that ive met her spirit every year since i discovered him. He has meant a great deal to me. I think he has given us you know, artists give energy. Thats part of what we do. And its just, its free, you know, we its not like its even a commercial thing ever. It may become commercial at some point, but part of what we do is we just give this energy and its, when youre from an are the pa of the culture that is oppressed, its a big gift because it means that people can keep going. And so, i feel that bob has kept millions of us going and when you see him dancing, when hes singing, hes a shaman so hes doing a shahmanic kind of dance when hes singing you see the purity of his giving and i think that millions of people around the world can connected with that, all people, that that is why he was so beloved. He was completely free and giving the transmission of deep caring about each other and the planet. And that was alice walker at her house in the Berkley Hills. Erkeley hills. Deborah and snellville georgia, please go ahead and make your comment. Thank you so much for taking my call. This is a really difficult question on who is my favorite guest on indepth, ive had so many, harold bloom, john mcwhorter, you just mentioned him. Initial list abi adored nicholas back lynn cheney i will always remember because i got through to talk to and i will never forget it. I ordered the program, got all of her books. It was lovely. She has a new one out. Caller i know. Im going to get it. I just love her. It was unique this time with her husband interviewing her. I thought that was really neat. But i love you all so much and its just the greatest thing in the world, booktv. Host we appreciate you watching. Eric, whats the name of your town . Caller a Great Program like usual. My favorite authors would be Christopher Hitchens and hansen. I love Christopher Hitchens. The book about no one left to lie to the anything Victor David Hanson as i think the guys pretty much a genius as far as that goes. His analogy of world war ii and is trumped books. Love your show. Keep that up. You dont have to read all the book, you can watch your show. Have a great day. Host the cliff notes. Heres the text along with what the gentleman just said. My favorite in depth author Christopher Hitchens although ironically ive not written any of his books at my favorite writer currently other than orwell is Christopher Hitchens and hes finishing his book now, america, the farewell to her. Next call is gordon in laramie, wyoming. Caller hey, pete, thanks for your service with cspan. Thanks for cspan. As jon meacham Sebastian Junger, any of those been on in depth, do you know . Prima once again i think sebastian, possibly has been on and yes, Sebastian Junger has been on. Who else did you mention . Caller jon meacham and james webb. Host jon meacham not yet. Someone weve been trying for. But sebastian we did a couple years ago from our new york studio. He owns the bar up there. We went up to new york and visited with him there. Caller whats the name of the bar . Host golly, blah blah. There was a couple years ago but he just had a new book out. Caller his book, war, wow just what a great writer. And then james webbs fields of fire, authoritative literature on vietnam, i believe. Host i dont think he has been on and i apologize im not as familiar withh that. Caller thats all right. Youl have a lot on your plate there, pete. Host we mentioned jon meacham in september. Caller great sense of humor. Host forse his book caller pigalle that she said its you, its really you and she went to grab a book and brought it back to them to sign and use john grisham novel. [laughing] host by the way we also interviewed john grisham. A couple times here on booktv which was always entertaining to say the least. Caller we like our local author, c. J. On his joe picket series. Good novels but nonfiction. Thanks, pete. Host thanks for calling in. Dr. Ben carson, he is an author of several books and he appeared on this program in 2013. I was an extraordinarily selfish young person as an adolescent. I was a person who thought i had a lot of rights. The more right you think you have, the more likely someone is to infringe upon your right so people are always infringing on my rights. I would go after people with baseball bats. I would get in fights, and once i even tried to stab another youngster with a knife. This scene is one of the picked it up in which cuba gooding, jr. Plays my part. We but after that incident i locked myself in the bathroom and i started contemplating my life. I realized trying to kill somebody over nothing, that i was seriously deranged. I prayed and i picked up a bible in the bathroom and it had all these verses in it about fools. Does that sound like me. It also had a lot of verses about anger, proverbs 19 19, there is no point of getting an angry man out of trouble, hes just gonna get right back into it. Proverbs 16 32 abverse after verse chapter after chapter they seem to they were written for me. While i remained in that bathroom for three hours i came understanding that it was not a sign of strength to punch somebody or kick down a door, it was a sign of weakness. It meant you could be controlled by other people and by the environment. I didnt want to be controlled but i also came to understand that it was my selfishness because somebody was in my space, somebody was taking my thing, somebody was doing something to me, it was always about me and my and i. I said if you can step outside the center of the circle and let it be about somebody else, maybe that will change things. I started trying that that day. I never had another angry outburst since that time. Hud secretary ben carson prior to being hud secretary, 2009 bill gertz, Frank Williams and abron so cocky, robert higgs, Christopher Buckley, bill ayres, john furling, host that and joy hickam were our guests that year. Several callers have brought up mr. Hitchens and it was in 2007 that Christopher Hitchens was on indepth. With someone like say billy graham, i think one can see the absomeone who doesnt believe any of this at all obut is a fairly reasonably good businessman. I have a reason to think ab there was a canadian billy graham, contemporary of his he went to billy graham and said, can you really go on sinning this stuff . Its too late to stop now. Lots of people expected from me. We are in business and thats what i think is the case with a surprisingly large amount. But i dont want to sound vulgar about it. Im not a lot of people means everything for a very great deal. Who dont try to profit from it and still stand to profit from it either. I did reduce everything to racket but i think the racketeering is and always has been an important absome religions certainly are our ab nothing more than the record of the cause of a successful con job. The Spiritual Life cant be entirely treduced to that and, heres the problem, do people really believe that . They dont know any more than you do whether there was a virgin birth or resurrection. If they say i believe it, they are still believing in something that they have to know very properly didnt take place. What are they asking us to believe . They are asking us to believe their propensity to faith. To sit take something on faith without argument or evidence. If somebody wants me to believe that, that they will do that, then i will but i feel that they are only against themselves. Probably doing themselves an injustice. Do think billy graham is an evil man . Yes, disgustingly evil man. The reason i say that, choosing one arm of the number of possible answers. I think jewish prejudice is unfairly sick. There some kind of prejudice i dont particularly like to ab but the only thing that convicts me of anything really and sanitary i would be a better person if i liked. [indiscernable] its a horrible pseudointellectual meanspirited eventually lethal piece of bigotry. You read this stuff that graham has been found to say on Richard Nixon on tape, you can go to the Nixon Library now, once you get over the revelation of what a bigot president nixon was, i knew that, you find that hes outmatched by the way billy graham talks. He goes out and rakes in the cash of preaching brotherhood and compassion. Its enough to make you sick. Mr. Ketchum passed away four years after that interview in 2011. In 2010 our guest michelle malkin, paul johnson, tr reid, john dean, pat buchanan, martha nussbaum, bill bennett, ralph nader, gordon ward, scientist a Jonah Goldberg and Salman Rushdie were all on, mention that paul johnson was one of our guests, the british historian. Heres a little bit from his appearance. We are living in an age where material advances are really very comforting and very considerable. We must be grateful for that. Of course where your email correspondent is near of a truth is over the moral condition of the world. There hasnt been much improvement there. Weve expanded enormously in a material sense but our morality appears to be in no better than ever in the past. Am afraid that is true and if we go back to history and look at the time of George Washington or go further back and look at the time of Queen Elizabeth and the alma mater or the middle ages and the crusades, or back further stills of the age of julius caesar, we have to admit the public morals on the whole have not substantially improved. There are still a large number of dreadful things that occur. Anyone who has lived through the middle decades of the 20th century as i did must take a certain pessimistic view about the ability of the world to improve his moral standards. Nevertheless, im not without hope that this can be done. I still take the view that on the whole the world is a good place and its getting to be a better place but we must all do, work our hardest to improve the moral standards because that is what is required. Leslie is in South Padre Island texas, i leslie, favorite author, favorite indepth guest and what are you reading . Ie leslie . Did you ever have oliver sacks on . I dont believe so. Hes british but he was made famous in the movie awakenings but a lot of other things. As for what im reading right now, i read newspapers, magazines, whats left of magazines. I so enjoy your program and i feel like books are so overlooked nowadays. Its rare to see someone reading a book. I love to see that when people are waiting to vote, some have a book in hand but i feel like the country is at a loss, especially the young people, by not being exposed to the great literature and all the other things. Thats my comment, i love booktv. What book is on your table right now . Ive got a table full of stuff but ive got something i havent oteven, im staying at vacation condo here in South Padre Island and sometimes there are books laying around, theres a man named, i guess maybe he was the author of the bourne identity, i dont know, deeric van les berger, its called last note. Are you staying down there on vacation or for the pandemic . Thats a long story but i will try to make it short. My parents retired here in the 80s, my dad was some from south texas, i came back and forth for years. Mom and dad are gone we still have the house but lits being worked on so im lucky enough to stay on the beach for a while. I still have my sister here and i am her legal guardian but its a beautiful place and its really the best best beach in texas. Its not as crowded as anyone would have been imagined. They left the beach open they have social distancing as far as you can have an umbrella up but only two people 15 feet apart. I dont mean to go on and on but its kind of the last stop my dad used to call if you look on a map youre almost in mexico, the tip of texas basically. You got a gorgeous day today. Thank you so much. I learned so much and feel like im part of the Community Watching booktv because you just dont find people that read books much anymore. They read the internet, thats all. Thanks again. Booktv is pretty active on social media as well. Our Facebook Page twitter page and instagram page, just remember booktv is the best handle. You can go online at booktv. Org, everything we been talking about today all the in Depth Programs are listed there, there is a tab at the top of the page that says in depth and you can click on one of those tabs and you can watch any of the programs we are talking about. In 2018 booktv made over the years weve had a few fiction authors but in 2019 we made a concerted effort to have only fiction authors. Certain types of fiction authors who wrote about issues, that type of thing. There was the list that we had on, david ignatius, colton whitehead, jeff shirer, walter mosley, david gil adachi, brad thor, cory doctorow, jacqueline woodson, geraldine brooks, cody pico, brad meltzer, those are the 12 we had on and jodi pico, the bestselling author, here she goes from her booktv program in 2018. I do love the concept of the novel as a way to educate about social justice because i think that, for example, when i wrote this book i sat down and read countless Guttmacher Institute studies about reproductive rights and about abortion statistics and things like that stop most dpeople dont sit dow and do that on a daily basis but they might pick up a novel. You think you are picking up a book to be entertained, you think you are picking up a book thats gonna whisk you away for a few hours but if i had done my job right, by the end of the book you wind up thinking hard about a topic you might otherwise not have approached. In that way i think fiction is so wonderfully sneaky wbecause it really gets peoples minds to crack wide open. Calliope in wallingford pennsylvania, high calliope. How are you . Good. I wanted to say that my favorite Nonfiction Author was Christopher Hitchens. By far and away, i also love sebastian younger and michelle malkin. Thats quite a range of people youve chosen. I have a very eclectic taste. Was there connecting fiber to those for . Just at different topics they covered. What are isyou doing in wellington pa . Im on disability now for injury but i was in radio. Host thanks for calling in, we appreciate it. Eleanor and katie south carolina. . Suet hi how are you. Caller i am doing great. Host you have called switch like to say . Smoothie i i am intrigued by the whole concept of this. Im pretty sure its before you wait into the fiction only year years, but robert caro has been on cspan i think many different over the years has certainly been my favorite you probably have, he is just a wonderful interviewee for many different respects because he know is his subject of course so intimately, Lyndon Johnson, and ear all on tender hooks waiting for him to complete the final installment of the lby balk. Host maybe over a year ago that connan obrien, a big pan, get him tout 0 california to interview him and we cover that on booktv as well. That was an interesting hour. I think theres a lot of us out there were not as high celebrity level as connan obryan but many of us are very interested in robert carrow. A lot of of us are waiting for him to finish that caller do we have any hints . I know he brian lamb is together to keep asking him when he will finish it. Do we have any hints. Host i dont have any hints. Maybe we should email him. Think its finishes when it finishes. Caller absolutely and worth the wait jo all right. Well, along with history and politics we also talk with science and tech writers, and it was in 2006 that futurist and inventor ray was on the program. Singhly man and machine will genetic one in the future . Guest let me describe how that will happen. Well send blood cell size device in our broadstream in a brains and into the brain thouz than larrys to keep us healthier, to reverse a are throw sclerosis, remove pathoens, remove debris, correct dna errors. Were doing the first generation of that already in animals. One scientist cured type one diabetes with a blood cell size twice that lets in scientist at m. I. T. Has a cell size dedigs that destroys cancer cells. And this is today. Take this mag magnification of the quarter century of the capability of Information Technology and computers and apply it it to what welcome do and 25 years well have these blood cell size guys that will be very sophies sophisticated, and keep us and expanding human intelligence. Our mall or nano boots. Guest nano refers to billionth or a meter and that menned the key feet features mentioned in a mod next number of nano meteres. Doesnt mean the nano body is one nano meter. It means the features are measured in a mod test number, five, ten, 20 nap know meter is the nano meters. The its the size of a blood cell and a blood cell is basically a nano robot and can be quite sophisticated. Thats one a couple of deficiencies. One significant deficiency of our white blood cells. I i have watched my own blighted blood chells theyre very slow. Biology actually quite sluggish. Took miswhite blood cell an hour 1 2 to destroy a these nano robes can do that in seconds and wont be subject to out at the immune disorders, Download Software from the internet. If that sounds future critic, there arlet of devices were put a until the body and brian up no today that download soft war prom outside the body. So i think devices get smaller, we are shrinking technology at an exponential rate, and so in 25 years these devices will be 100,000 times smaller in terms of key features and theyll be a bill times more capable and theyre already pretty impressive. 202 is the area code to make a comment in the last 20 multiples of in depth. 7488200 in eastern and central time zones. 7488201, and 7027488903 if you want to send a text, include your first name and stiff as well. Ellen in maryland here in the baltimore washington year. Ellen, go ahead. Caller hi, peter. So wonderful to talk to you. Where to begin. Its just as ive been watching you just in the last little while, i was think can but the last interview i think brian lamb did with Christopher Hitchenses while he was getting chemotherapy, and it was so powerful and so moving. Just reaired a few weeks ago. Anyway, hitchens, Christopher Buckley, pj orourke, heather mcdonald, and im just reading now intellectuals by paul johnson, and imagine include when i just turn on magically when i just turn on the show there was a clip from paul johnson, and i do wonder why you stopped going to visit authors in their work spaces. I thought maybe it got too expensive or something, but i enjoy that feature when you were doing it. Host it was a good feature i want to thank you. Host youre one of the many people who have chastised that decision that we cut back a little bit on those. It was time consuming, it was they were important, youre right, ellen, and probably something to reconsider. I appreciate that. Jay in walk. In washington, dc,. Caller an excellent afternoon. Muched of indicating, a big booktv fan, have a book here black you finished reading a couple of years ago by paul porter, and i get it from you. I booktv and fascinating book, right in the Stomping Ground of your area there of cspan, would be in George George hoe tele, et cetera, and real good read. Host i think we covered that on booktv. Caller oh, okay. And so many books here i havent actually read, but your program. Is so rich, i like to make one comment, though, on one of your guests. Jet jody pecoult. Fascinating author, so Rearview Mirror in her dialogue and perspectives that theyre so educational. Thank you so much, peter. Host thank you for calling in and thank you for watching, 2011 that feminist Phyllis Benis was on along with conservative political activist r emmett tyler. Pauline, issue ma reed, eric posner, linda hogan, ann coulter, ellis coast, michael moore, and david bronx were all on. It and was in august that an coulter joined us. Of journalists who are allowed to interview ann coulter again for a second time. Why too, i. Guest short lift. Host seven names and ill fine it. Why here it is. You have on that list, john cloud of Time Magazine, Jonathan Friedland a of 0 the guardian, jamie of front page magazine, taylor hill of jam bands. Com. Jonathanpits, the baltimore sun, Charlotte Allen of belief net. Com and fish bowl tb. Why are those chosen few. Guest originally only three, and i chose them specifically because they bring a tape recorder when i talked and then apparently played the tape recorder back before typing what i said and i promise you that is shockingly rare. Host do you get misquoted a lot . Guest well, somehow i say we need to rules the Capital Gains rate and comes outs i support hitler and all his works. No, its insane the misquotes, and often the mall has in hi statement is there malice in my statement there is put the victim and vigor of the quote is completely vac tombed out. The joke bomb squad is gone and so originally simply the by the way , i they were all liberals who do not agree with my politics and yet they quoted me accurately. So i dont dare what they say in the body of the piece. What they say about me. Just quote me accurately. And three of them did and then a few got add who did quote me accurately, but then it became a special request and people wanted to be on that list and is a good ensign testify incentive. That that nine years other, know call from rose app na camarillo, california. Who are reading, favorite author, fair rift in Depth Program. Caller im a first time call and my 80s and if on been watching this programming since it far started. One thing i want to stay. When theres an author my booksle awe political the ones like some support i pay full price. The ones dont like i buy the books at the lee library so i can support the library. Host all right. So no ahead. Host who are your authorses you like . Caller oh, i like all the political ones, tom friedman and i do have to say my husband is of one political bent and im the other. We have been happily married for 57 years, so he pays the regular price and on the books he wants and i pay the regular price on the books i want and then we have extra copied of his because after all a wife has so serve her husband once in a while. Thats all. Host thats roseanne in california, appreciate you calling in. Jeany safers book, speaking of politic, love youve but i hate your politic ises the name of her book, probably good for this season. Sarah, south carolina. Good afternoon. Caller good afternoon. How are you. Host how are are you. Want to thank you for your education and happy 20th 20th anniversary. Host thank you, maam. Was going through a divorce and a buyout of my husband on mar Marthas Vineyard and i didnt understand what was going on with me money market and he recommended i read the colassal failure of common sense by lawrence mc mcdonald and this a inside store of the collapse of lehman brothers, and it was fascinating to me. Host is that did we that on booktv . I know we covered one bang on the collapse of lehman. Im not sure caller i didnt well, so informative and ive been a Real Estate Broker for so long and i was in massachusetts. I wish there was more then well issue did just come across a great book and i found out it by your television show. I was on cspan2 and its the captain pay, wont pay cant pay, wont pay, the coalition where the change would be the sum of the parts to leverage bad loans and the changing of how mortgaging, lending, school loans, helping the tenant landlords who took advantage of the collapse and bought things and how when you buy property, it goes. Host that was a pretty recent book. Caller yeah. Its free online. Thats where i stayed up all night, i think i read for six hours. Host thank you for calling in. It was in 2006 that Award Winning historian from duke university, John Hope Franklin was our getz. In his 90s at the time he was here. But this is one where we had gone down to visit him at his home in durham ahead of the program. Host were in professor John Hope Franklins backyard, and he has a greenhouse back here. Could you tell us what you do back here. Guest ive been growing orchid for almost 50 years. I got hooked on orchids when i was teaching one summer in 1959 at the university of hawaii. And i came back, in brooklyn, living in brooklyn, teaching there, and i came back, brought a few orchids, i didnt know what to do with them. Then i built the Winter Greenhouse in brooklyn and i got started there then. These are just various those are just beginning to open up there. Host is it a difficult task or a Specialized Task to keep this orchids healthy . Guest yes. Its a it takes some doing. You have to keep the greenhouse fairly clean, clean of fungus and various things that would be dehe deconcern to their growth. This is a vanilla plant that has gotten out of control, vanilla is an orchid. The mose important or orchid that there is. Host dr. Fran fan died three years after that interview. In 2012, chris hedges was on the program along with mark stein, harvards randle kennedy, brookhiser. Tom brokaw. Michael beschloss, steven johnson, Kenneth Davis and former senator the late tom coburn, 2013, bartlett and steele, our january guests. Theyve written a couple of bestselling political books and expo expos says. Aim in good moan, melfully phillips, Rick Atkinson who is working on a trilogy of the early days of the u. S. Mary roach, pen carson, ben shapiro, john lewis, debtee kelly and kristina hoff sumperses and in 2009 a few callers brought him up and we talk but his father, Christopher Buckley was on the program. He writes mostly satirical fiction. Heres a little bit of his program. I got the idea for thank you for smoking one day. I was making supper watching the Mcneill Lehrer news hour then called i still think of it as the Mcneill Lehrer and still make he chuckle. They had sun one who was there to present the latest evidence that smoking is, hello, bad for you, and he had at least two ph. Ds after his name, at the bottom of the screen. And to balance it out they had on someone from the Tobacco Institute which was the tobaccos industrys lobby here and he was this gorgeous, attractive woman name brennan dawson, and every time the scientist from the National Institutes of, youll know, not smoking, whatever, said something, presented the evidence, which had to at least seven worlds in it that were incomprehend incomprehensible. She would oh, please. Sort or squirt lemon juice on this guy and make it up so as this he was just being the most preposterous phony in the world. I thought thats got to be an interesting job. Get up in the morning, brush your teeth, say goodbye to the kids and sell death for a living. So i called her up and said i have to hang out with you. If was a little oblique what i was up to and i got to hang out with her, and at one point after could couple consecutive days i said, youll in the, theres something i really dying to ask you but i feel a little awkward. She said she was smoking and she beautiful smoker in her office and she is like lauren backal and she said i know what a nice girl leak meek doing in a place like this and i said yes, thats exactly it. She said im just paying the mortgage. And i thought, in the book this becomes the yuppy nuremberg defense. Only paying the mortgage. That was Cliff Buckley in 2009. This text from mary jo in dearborn, michigan, my favorite interview is geraldine brooks. I look people of the book and year of wonders. And her next Nonfiction Book, hopefully, is cast by isabelle wilkerson. Robert carrow has been referenced. He hi writing a multivolume set on Lyndon Johnson and the johnson years. Here he is talking about one of those volumes. I am going to go to live in the Southern City for as long as it takes for me to find out exactly what differences it pa made in the love of black people in the south of Lyndon Johnson got the Voting Rights. Host do you nowhere youll live yet in. Guest , tames tike. Host when will you do that. Guest im going to go on a book tour now, then we always spend two months in france, and then im going to start. Host what beaut the idea i know you mentioned in the past going to vietnam. Guest yes. You remember everything. Thats the two things i want to do because if i can just say, i try to write about political power and feel you dont write about it fully enough unless you write about the man who uses but its effect on the people on whom its idea for good or ill. For good, Lyndon Johnson threw this great Civil Rights Act of his presidency and Voting Rights act, transformed the political power of black people in america. I want to go to a Southern City and see what did thats man . Do you have sures now, sidewalks paved . How do you feel but the sheriff now that you can vote for a sheriff. Are your schools better . Exactly what difference do you have more hope thannure father did that your childrens life will be better than yours because of Lyndon Johnson . However, the other side ofline don johnsons presidency is vietnam. And one thing i independ to dos to try to show what it means when a modern industrialized nation makes war on certainly not a primitive nation but a rural peasant nation. I want to go to vietnam and see how that works and probably live in a vietnamese villages that were b52s. The horrible thing is the b502s flew so high that not only were they invisible from the ground but you cant here them so the villages didnt know they were being bombedden in in the bombs actually hit. Host in 2014, mar levin, born any morris, big west, lewis rodriguez, ron paul, mary francis berry, joan, michael cord ya and Arthur Brooks all appeared. Neil degraph tieson was with us in 2017. Heres a portion. I was asked by the New York Times, some impasse, self impasses ago in congress and they thought they would have fun and ask people who are definitely not politicians what solutions do they have for getting things through congress and fixing things and i think the way they asked it was if your were president what would you do . So i wrote back, if i were president , i wouldnt be president. Its on my website. If i were president. You going that and my name mike take you New York Times times part but i dupe mix indicated in my website because they cut out a paragraph because there was not enough space. So the full response to that question is there. It comes down the expectation that if you run for office, you somehow can change everything. And im not convinced of that. Im at contrarian here. My views of the literal opposite of what a lobbyist does. Lobbyist goes straight to to politician to influence the politician in ways that serve the interests of the lobbyist and who they represent. For me, any elected official represents people who put them into office. So as an educator, what matters is not so much who the official is, what matters is what the state of enlight ment of who is doing the voting because if people, for example, all new recognized and valued, what sciences and how and why it works, they would never even dream of voting for someone who doesnt know that. Because that person would then not represent their full interests. So, i would rather educate an electorate so they can put people in office who can make scientific informed decisions about everything they do, rather than just install myself into office and lead people who dont yet have this knowledge or insight. Thats not what and 88 i did the math 88 of Congress Stanford reelection every two years, so you can convince one congressman or another but then you have to start all over again. You educate the electorate, were good. I go to the bahamas, elect people who will take this country into the future rather than back into the cave. And unfortunately we ran out of time. We had some other video to show you from michelle malkin, noam chomsky, studs turkle and jimmy carter and unfortunately we are unable to get to that video. But all of those programs are unfortunately we are unable to get to the video but all of those programs are available on our website at booktv. Org. To watch in their entirety. Thanks for being with us and thanks for being with us this past 20 years. You are watching booktv on cspan2, and you begin with the latest Nonfiction Books and authors. Cspan2 created by americas cabletelevision companies as a Public Service and brought to you today by your television provider. Booktv on cspan2 has top Nonfiction Books and authors every weekend. Saturday at 1 p. M. Eastern from a a recent virtual southern festival of books authors reflect on life in appalachia. Watch booktv this weekend on cspan2