interested to learn a little bit more about his background in new jersey and, um, how he got to be who he is. and we're also going to read dan brown's "inferno," which i think is the ultimate summer beach book. i've read the other dan brown books, and i think miles will enjoy this one. he has a real knack for ending his chapters with cliffhangers that make you turn the page. and so i think miles will end joy that a lot, and i think -- enjoy that a lot, and i think we'll have lots to talk about. so should be a fun summer of reading. >> let us know what you're reading this summer. tweet us @booktv, post it on our facebook page or send us an e-mail at booktv@c-span.org. >> the famous passage in one of william faulkner's novels, he said for every southern boy 14 years old or older, it's still 1:00 in the afternoon on july 3rd, 1863. picket's charge hasn't happened yet. it's all on the line. and they can, in their imagination, say this time, maybe this time victory, independence. so in the minds of, i think, both northerners and southerners, northerners at the time but southerners more in retrospect, this payment the mythic moment -- this became the mythic moment of victory and defeat. >> the 150th anniversary of the battle of gettysburg live all day, sunday, june 30th, on american history tv on c-span3. >> are you interested in being a part of booktv's online book club? our selection this month is sheryl sandberg's book, "lean in: women, work and the will to lead." in "lean in," ms. sandberg, who's the coo of facebook, discusses why it's still difficult for women to achieve leadership roles in the united states. she also talks about her own career choices and experiences. you can watch her talk about "lean in" at booktv.org, and as you read the book this month, post your thoughts on twitter with the hash tag btv book club and write on our facebook page, facebook.com/booktv. and then on june 25th at 9 p.m. eastern, join our live, moderated discussion on both social media sites. and if you have an idea for next month, send your suggestion on which books you think we should include in our online book club via twitter, facebook or e-mail at booktv@c-span.org. >> you're watching booktv on c-span2, and here's a look at our prime time lineup for tonight. coming up next, roger lipsey talks about the life of dag hammarskjold. then at 8, george shultz presents his book, "issues on my mind." at 9 p.m. eastern, it's a look at alice walker's collection of essays, letters and poems titled "the cushion in the road." and at 10 p.m. eastern, sally patel joins us to discuss her book, "brainwashed." and we wrap up tonight's prime time programming at 11 eastern with matthew hancock. his book is "masters of nothing: human nature, big finance and the fight for the soul of capitalism." visit booktv.org for more on this weekend's television schedule. >> and now roger lipsey talks about his biography of former u.n. secretary-general and nobel peace prize winner dag hammarskjold who die inside a plane crash -- died in a plane crash. this is about 45 minutes. >> it's a custom in occasions such as this to thank and demonstrate one's awareness of the eminent people in the world, and i'm so pleased you're here. thank you for speaking. and anne nick old, i'm so pleased you invited me to come here. and then all of you vice presidents and presidents, thank you very much. i wanted, first -- i want, first, to tell you what we're going to speak about. i'll take about a half hour, and then we can speak together for 15 minutes or so. our topic, as i see it, is diplomacy, particularly u.n. diplomacy with the purpose of establishing or reestablishing peace and justice, peace with justice. it's to speak of that in hammarskjold's terms as a profound cultural act. a profound cultural and creative act. that was how he lived it, that was how he, in effect, taught it because he was often in a very understated way teaching the u.n. community how he viewed all sorts of matters and how they might in turn also view them. so before we talk that up -- we take that up though, i thought that we should summon the image of dag hammarskjold, and we can do that through a much abridged but nonetheless, i hope, interesting sequence of slides. this is a portrait of hammarskjold taken in the middle of his years at the u.n. which i think we can take as quite classic. this is the marvelously blue-eyed, marvelously composed, curiously-warm, curiously-cold and remote mr. hammarskjold. and this also is mr. hammarskjold. this is the kind of scene that he lived for years and years and years. this is, i think, in africa or -- i didn't take time to check just what the scene is, but this was a scene that was reproduced hundreds of times during his eight and a half years as secretary general. that his eyes are closed indicates fatigue, indicates that he's been asked too many questions. but this was his, this was his job, was to face the world, to face its journalists, to face its diplomats, to be firm, to be immensely intelligent in front of extremely difficult situations. now, all of you know that there were two great aspects of hammarskjold. one was the senior diplomat of his time, a diplomat of genius. and the other was the journal keeper, the person who all through his young manhood and middle years as a swedish civil servant at the end of his swedish civil service career, he was cabinet member was keeping a private journal which was never revealed. no one had read it. and he simply informed a friend toward the end of his years at the u.n. that there existed a journal, that he would leave a note on it for this friend, and the friend could decide whether to publish it or not. this is a page from the journal just at the moment in early april when he was on his way to, when he was on his way to accept the post of secretary general. and at the top as several swedes here and swedish friends have already read is, are words that mean not i, but god in me. people have taken that as an assertion, as if this is something that could be imposed. it's not at all an assertion. it's a prayer. and this was his fundamental prayer as he entered upon u.n. service, is that somehow through the flawed human vehicle that he was that the, that a righteous providence could act. now, another -- he was quite a poly-- he was multilingual, so what you see there is 16th century french at the bottom and swedish in the middle. so perhaps i, there's one thing i would like to translate for you, because these were -- he was formulating his wishes at this time in 7, april, 1953, his inauguration as secretary general. it was the 10th of april, as the ambassador said. and what the early french says is from thomas -- [inaudible] who was one of the sources that he read so very often. he had it with him on his last trip to the congo. and it says being founded and firmly placed in god, they cannot in any way be proud. and because they render to god all of the good with which they are overwhelmed, they do not receive glory, one from another. but they desire only that of god alone. so this is the other side of dag hammarskjold. what one saw at the inauguration was this slender, marvelously composed individual who gave a perfectly wonderful speech at the u.n. this is what one saw. within him there was, let's just say for now, a prayer. i wanted you to see his handwriting. it's, obviously, unique. there were jokes about it. someone -- he acknowledge today a journalist that -- acknowledged to a journalist that it looks as if it could be read either forwards or backwards and vaguely looks like arabic. but it gives you a sense for an immensely disciplined, compressed, rather abstract mentality, does it not? so the april 10, 1953, the young secretary general. i wanted to show you his places. this is his office. it's a photograph by paul nilson who was a very well known swedish photographer. it's not often published, so it's quite -- you know, it's pleasant for us to see it here. it captures the loneliness of the man. and the loneliness had two aspects as i and others have interpreted it. on the one hand, the position of secretary general involves myriad relationships, myriad connections and also a certain distance of necessity. and that distance, that solitude of someone who cannot be compromised, who must enter in but cannot be swallowed up is somehow reflected in this image. the other aspect of his loneliness is that he was, after all, a bachelor, and when christmas came around, he had the experience that so many people who live on their own have. he was, he would feel lonely, and the main, the main people who knew him cared for him on a personal basis would invite him for a christmas dinner or something of that kind. so he did suffer from time to time from a profound loneliness. and yet he eventually understood that his aloneness -- which is different from loneliness -- had to be, that it was, that it was a structure, a personal structure, an identity that he could not overcome and need not. here's another of his places. this is the living room in the his apartment on 73rd street just off of park avenue. you know, i'm an art historian, so i have quite a good time trying to interpret objects. but one object -- and it's not so easy always with him. but one object that is interpret bl here is the isaaks. it was given him by -- [inaudible] do you remember his name? who was the sherpa who accompanied sir edmund hillary on the first successful ascent of mount everest. and he knew that hammarskjold was a very strong mountaineer although only in the swedish north country where mountains, as he said, require more what he called evil wristics than -- which means a balance -- than scaling tremendous heights. but knowing that he was a mountaineer and caring for him and for the u.n., he gave him this with the inscription, an amazing inscription "so that you can climb to greater heights." and that's written on that object. the little ship is a model that was given him after the first eight months or so that he was at the u.n. because he often enough referred to the, to columbus' mission to the west across an unknown ocean to what he thought would be the indies but what turned out to be a brand new continent, and he often compared the u.n. experience to columbus' experience, setting off into the unknown. and someone had the bright idea of giving him a little model of the santa maria. so it shows you something of how he lived. he also by the end of 1953 had, i'm not sure if it's rented or bought, a country home in bruceer, new york -- brewster, new york, which is about 60 miles north of here which when he could escape to it, was a great relief to him. and he often wrote in his journal there. wanted to show you also now that we've seen his places some of his attitudes at the u.n. here he's speaking with the director of security. it's one of my favorite photos of him. it shows, it shows a clever man, a shrewd man. that is a highly intelligent face and also one that is, um, the raised eyebrows, the wrinkled brow. the entire look is of man who has been around the block. here he's sitting in 1959 with the the burmese diplomat whom he held in great regard and who actually became his successor after the air crash that took his life in september 1961. he's sitting here at the hypoed yum, the dais -- high podium, at the dais, and this was something that was so characteristic of him. the left-hand chair. if you look at the dais, there are three chairs. the left-hand chair for the secretary general, the middle for the annual president of the general assembly, the one on the right for the secretary general's chief of staff. again, obviously to, a favorite photograph. brian workhart, to whom i owe so very much as all of us do who care for hammarskjold, has this photo among very few in his work space to this day, and it simply shows hammarskjold in an elevator bank probably on the 38th floor of the u.n. in a, in a pose that is so characteristic, you know? again, inward, composed, within himself and yet reading papers that need, that needed his attention. he loved press conferences. you know, you would think that this intellectual which, of course, he was would somehow be averse to press conferences. he had the best time. he found them to be games of wit, of cat and mouse. when he needed to, he was extremely revealing in press conferences, because he wanted the public to know certain things as a way of pinning them down, of making them a matter of public record. but, but when he didn't want the press to know something, he could be immensely entertaining while saying nothing whatever. so this reflects his joy. and since i, there's so much gravitas in my book -- please read it, you will see -- [laughter] in short order how much gravitas there is, i wanted to put that joyful press conference attitude on the cover of the book. this isn't joyful at all. the event that both thoroughly tested him and also created his reputation among the delegations to the u.n. was the so-called mission to, at the time it was called peking, the mission to beijing. finish the issue, here he's on the eve of leaving for beijing where he had agreed to -- and had been welcomed by the very brilliant prime minister of the new people's republic of china to negotiate possibly the freedom of 13 -- or was it 11 american airmen who while on u.n. duty under the u.n. flag had been shot out of the air over china and were being treated as spies rather than as prisoners of war which is, as you know, is a wholly different status and potentially a, you know, could lead to lifelong imprisonment. so while there are many details surrounding the mission to beijing, i thought you might be interested in this image which shows the compression on him of events as he goes forth into an unknown. and this -- his great success, although it took ten months to realize, this was december 1954, his success by july of 1955 made virtually everyone realize that he was someone that one had to take seriously. this is him with the prime minister. in 1955 the u.n. celebrated its tenth anniversary, and there was a big meeting in san francisco. i should think the meeting was very, very pleasant. how can anything be unpleasant in san francisco? [laughter] um, and hammarskjold played his role. he gave a talk there. it was very interesting. at the same time, he was really very realistic about the difficulties of the u.n. i mean, it was torn by the cold war conflict. it -- there was so much waiting in the wigs to happen in 1955 -- wings to happen in 1955, summer of 1955. and he wrote into his journal the following really dark but firm statement: you are dedicated to this task, addressing himself, as the sacrifice in a still barbarian cult because of the divine intention behind it. it is a feeble creation of men's hands, but you must give your all to this dream, for that alone anchors it in reality. now, i consider that last idea lastingly important. you must give your all to this dream, for that alone anchors it in reality. he's drawing a distinction there which he draws elsewhere as well in other contexts between a good idea, good feeling, fine intentions and total commitment even to the point of willing, selfless commitment. that was his credo, that was not what he altogether expected of others, but he hoped for it from others where the u.n. was within concerned. -- was concerned. and that, he says in the journal, is what endows the u.n. with reality. i find that interesting. i want to tell you just since nobody else knows it, but now you also will know it, that the artist of these perfectly wonderful "time" covers is a man named boris. this was the son of theodore, the russian basso who, you know, owned the opera stage in the 1920s and '30s. i don't think this is by boris, but it takes us to the next major event in his u.n. career which was the suez crisis. you probably remember that the suez canal which was the lifeline of the british empire for oil and food and personnel passing through the suez canal to india and other parts of the empire that in 1956 owing to terrible stresses being exerted on him, president nasser of egypt nationalized the canal. within -- the u.n. attempted with hammarskjold's very, very strong guidance to negotiate a set of satisfactory outcome from this nationalization. but meanwhile, the british and the french and the israelis began conspiring to overturn nasser's government and to occupy the suez canal. that -- hammarskjold was out in the middle east. he invented shuttle diplomacy. mr. kissinger did not, mr. hammarskjold did. he was out in the middle east for, at the request of the general assembly and security council to try to establish something resembling if not peace, then at least the armistice, the willingness not to shoot at each other that had been put there some years earlier. and meanwhile, even while he was out there these three powers were conspiring to overturn nasser and occupy the suez canal in a most, most reckless way. so this was the origin of peacekeeping forces. the notion that a peacekeeping, a u.n. peacekeeping force staffed by many, many nations could intervene between the combatants in this case and keep the peace was reestablish the peace grew out of this moment in his, in his career. the author of the idea of peacekeeping was a very brilliant canadian diplomat, later prime minister, lester pearson. he worked very closely be hammarskjold. when pearson received a nobel prize for the concept and execution of peacekeeping, he really gave all the credit to hammarskjold where it was probably due. it's a very interesting story. and brian workhart was the muscle that with ralph bunch -- some of you know of ralph bunch, the brilliant african-american nobel laureate who was one of hammarskjold's inner circle. so that is what you're looking at, is hammarskjold, a peaceful man with no military experience prior to this reviewing the troops. and he did this many, many times. and strange to say his adviser, general rickier, an indian whom he really trusted, said that hammarskjold was a good commander, a good commander in chief. because of his long heritage of military men behind him and said that hammarskjold wasn't afraid of the military the way so many were in high places in the u.n. i don't think he was pleased to be reviewing the troops, but he knew how to do it. enter if between sue -- in between suez which was resolved so brilliantly and the congo crisis which this cover reflects -- this is, you can read the date, it's from summer 1960 -- there were numbers of peacekeeping missions. one, yet another innovation. the ambassador said that hammarskjold didn't consider the charter immutable, that he worked with it to find within it opportunities to fill in gaps that hadn't been noticed when the charter was written. and one of these was in these years before congo, between suez and congo, was the establishment of the program of special representatives. and this hammarskjold worked out while he was in jordan. where there was a great need for some representation of the u.n. directly responsible to the secretary general. but light, you know, not a whole committee, not a whole building full of people, but a number of people led by one who was highly responsible and directly connected. so the whole special representative program appeared in the years between suez and the congo. the congo was lethal in many, many respects. i don't think there's time for me to begin to tell the whole story, but the gist of it is that when the republic of the congo was granted independence on june 30, 1960, by the belgians who were the colonizing agent, the colonizing entity, the congolese had not been well prepared at all for, to manage a government, to manage a people, to manage infrastructure. and things fell apart incredibly fast, within days. the congo was in chaos. patrice hemum baa called bonn with his president -- called upon the u.n. to intervene. hammarskjold got this message in geneva, and he said i don't know where this is going to lead, but i know i have to lay it on. those were his words. so he laid it on. and this shows lemumba at the u.n. in august of 1960. things went from bad to worse, to worst in the sequence of events. the most, the mineral-rich province in the southeast seceded with the protection of the belgians and of the british, although it wasn't fully acknowledged and very possibly of the americans, although it wasn't fully acknowledged, but certainly the belgians. and that stripped away from the congo about 50% or more of its revenue potential. so it created an impossible situation. hammers jold -- hammarskjold worked and worked with his core people and spent peacekeepers, of course, peacekeeping force. there were 19,000 peacekeepers at one point. and things just kept deteriorating. his attitude, his attitude was dual. he worked immensely hard with all of his inner circle to set things right if what emerged as -- in what emerged as a cold war conflict between the soviet bloc who said he was a lackey of the capitalists, of the imperialists trying to create a neocolonialism. and on the other side, the belgians were just dragging their feet and had a lot of support from the western democracies, covert support by and large. it was an immensely difficult matter. a truly wonderful indian diplomat was his man in the congo for a very critical period, and here's a cable that hammarskjold wrote to dial at a particularly difficult can point. it is a cable, and i'll just preserve the cable language. as it regards political situation, one major difficulty is that we can never get inside the skin of our congolese friends or disentangle outside maneuvers. for that reason we are constantly under handicap which we cannot overcome. for that reason also, i find it dangerous to base our actions on anything but rather general concepts as to interplay of forces to extent we find our analysis supported by confirmed facts. believe that on the whole we will get safer results with this skeptical approach. believe also that this may save us from danger of getting tied up in congo-type intrigues which grow like mushrooms and die like mushrooms and mostly like mushrooms are rather poise onous -- poisonous. so that's the unedited hammarskjold. the diplomat, this is not -- this is, actually, excellent diplomatic advice to his peer. in what was then leopoldville, now kinshasa. but it's framed with a lot of personal bite and irony. i knew when i came here that i had enough material for a daylong seminar. [laughter] and, um, i just want to mention two things. one is something about his death. the secession of katonga was like a -- it was a wound. it was a wound to the u.n., it was a wound to the congo, and it became a hot wound, an infected wound in september 1961 when several of hammarskjold's subordinates in the congo took measures that he had not approved except in principle. he expected that there would be a round-up of mercenaries who were a great problem and a ship, you know, an outshipping of the mercenaries back to where they belonged, out of the congo. and he wanted that to happen, but he didn't want that to happen until he'd come to the congo and had a chance to speak with his lieutenants there. they wanted to -- it appears -- they wanted to give him the gift of a solved problem before he arrived or as he arrived. and so something resembling a war broke out. hammarskjold, everybody was deeply disturbed, and hammarskjold eventually decided the fly over to what seemed to be a safe haven in what was then northern rhodesia, the copper belt, mining copper belt, to negotiate a cease fire. that was his aim with the head of this seceded province. and he got on an airplane in the late afternoon, and about midnight it, over the airport it crashed. the nature of that crash is being -- at the time there were three investigations. one of them by the u.n. and while the u.n. investigation did not completely eliminate the possibility of foul play because, certainly, there were interests in katonga and elsewhere that might have imagined that being rid of mr. hammarskjold would be a good thing for their cause, um, nonetheless, the notion of pilot error has prevailed for 40 years. at this time there is a, an investigation, a privately-funded investigation underway, and in september there will be a report on that privately-funded investigation by a very imminent retired, distinguished individual, swedish, english, african. and we'll see what that report says. so that's the comment i want to make on that. now, the next hour of my talk can which won't exist is to say something about hammarskjold's spiritual life and to say something about the way his spirituality informed his conduct as an individual diplomat. and so i recommend really that those of you who care for, who care for the u.n. let alone for hammarskjold read in the book and see how that worked. the -- i often feel or i've come to feel since i've rung up that great individuals, great men, great women who are for the good, you know, who are not great tyrants but really for the good, have a capacity to infuse the field of action which includes all of us, which includes the community with a, with purpose, with a vitality, with a kind of mixture of good humor and gravity with many, many qualities. and such people infuse the field. and while they are alive, the field remains sparkling. and this was certainly so in hammarskjold's time. the spirituality that he bore within him and which he did not often reveal during his lifetime, the greatest revelation was the room of quiet which has that very beautiful message which is still, still available there. to though he did not directly often reveal his intense spirituality, his christian faith which broadened and broadened so that really one could say as one of his friends did that he outwinged religion as usually understood, that intensity, that inner intensity that he possessed is, was a factor that kept the field sparkling, interesting, important, never slack. and he actually said to, i think, a perfect wonderful swedish writer who, like hammarskjold, was a member of the swedish academy, he said that in this work we're doing every detail counts. and that reflects -- and he meant it. that reflects the way in which the field of contact, the field of attention that he created around him and that lifted up everybody really, how all the details were touched by what he was. so how to, how to conclude? perhaps with a few words that he said. you can feel the threat against the future stronger and stronger, but paradoxically enough, parallel to that is growing and irrational conviction that we shall be able to break through the causal chain of fear, clumsiness, self-assertion and plain common stupidity. and he also said and this reflects the breadth of his vision the serve signals from a wound are felt at once all through the body of mankind. i often think about, you know, great men and women, and the, both the joy that we can learn from them and the burden that they impose on us because one can't help but feel like, you know, in my case a small fellow relative to mr. hammarskjold or many other mr.s and mrs.s. we all have our, we all have our models, our role models. and what i think is necessary to face is a, what i call a wrestling match with the great ones and really engaging with them, really knowing who they were, what they said, what they stood for. assimilating, making them my colleague. and if that process can occur again with mr. hammarskjold in the united nations, then i say, i say, good. thank you. [applause] now, i've eaten up all the time, and i need to turn to a president or vice president for advice. [laughter] >> anyone have any questions? any questions? [inaudible] >> yes. if you were in a spiritual sense to channel dag hammarskjold, how would you say that he today would critique the united nations of today? >> um, i have, i have the peculiar flaw of knowing more about the united nations in the 1950s than in this decade. and it's simply so. i've spent years working on this book about the 1950s. however, i do not think that mr. hammarskjold would have come in with guns blazing. i think that he would have done, in effect, what he did when he became secretary general. he went around to every office and shook hands with 4,000 people. and talked with them. and i think that after those 4,000 conversations he might draw a circle around him of people he felt were experienced and wise and make a program. but he wouldn't start with what you called a critique. he would start with hello. sir? >> wait for the mic. >> thank you for writing this book. i've been waiting two decades for a good book on dag hammarskjold. and the photography that you picked was wonderful. my question is going to be maybe somewhat parochial because as an american what would dag hammarskjold's relationship with john foster dulles and dwight eisenhower? and it appears briefly eisenhower saw eye to eye with him on the suez crisis. >> yeah. he was, privately, he was not very patient about dulles. i mean, someone -- i don't think it was him -- said dull dulles. [laughter] but i think he rather shared that view. and dulles pressured him in ways that were just not sensible. but with eisenhower it was different. he was, i think, sincerely grateful when eisenhower gave the atoms for peace speech. he was sincerely for numbers of things, of policy, of proposals or actions that eisenhower took. he thought it was unconscionably stupid on the part of the americans to send 10,000 troops to the lebanon. he wrote a very funny let or about that that you'll -- letter about that that you'll find in my book. this was 1958 when there was a problem in the lebanon, but it wasn't -- it really didn't need an amphibious landing. hammarskjold wrote a very funny letter saying that the americans, because things worked out quite well there diplomatically, he said the american troops had nothing to do but drink coca-cola. so have i covered your question, sir? >> yeah. [applause] >> we'd like to hear from you. tweet us your feedback, twitter.com/booktv. >> what are you reading this summer? booktv wants to know. >> well, i have a lot of history and biography that i am reading. the book i'm reading currently, and i'm about halfway through, is called "indispensable: when leaders really matter," and it's a book by a harvard professor. and it's an excellent book on sort of different leadership styles. basically, it has this leadership filtration theory where there are filtered leaders, you know, well known politicians who move themselves up in the ranks, and then there are others who are obscure who come through who are going to be unpredictable as a result because they're not as well known. lincoln was such a leader. unfiltered. had only won one term in congress, was an obscure figure from illinois. so when he got to the white house, he was unpredictable. and yet, of course, proved to be one of the best leaders in the history of the united states. that's not always the case b i it's a fashion -- but it's a fascinating theory where he applies this theory to a number of leaders like jefferson and wilson and winston churchill and, of course, lincoln. so it's a great read. i'm halfway through. so books i've recently read, evan thomas is a great writer and great biographer. his theory in this book sort of is that ike eisenhower was not as appreciated as he should have been, that he had method to his madness, and he was -- though he might have seemed to be sort of a bumbler and not in charge, secretly he actually was quite. >> shrewd and very much in charge and knew what he was doing. i have to admit having read the whole book and being open to that theory that, actually, he doesn't mean to, but he kind of proves the opposite. this book pretty much tells you that eisenhower was often a sick man, very serious illness, heart disease, and was often very disengaged from his own cabinet, delegated a lot like in foreign policy to john foster dulles, his secretary, secretary of state. so it's an interesting book, but i actually think he disproves his own thesis which is kind of fun when you think about it. another book real important to me because i actually served in the senate in the years, many of the years covered by the book called "the last great senate." which he profiles a number of senators during sort of what he thinks is a golden age in the senate in the '60s and '70s and some of the '80s. characters like ted kennedy and howard baker and jacob javits and ed muskie and robert c. byrd who got things done, who reached across the aisle, who were willing to break with chair own party otter -- break with their own party orthodoxy kind of bemoaning that we don't do that anymore very much, and he documents how much got done with that spirit of collaboration and compromise. great read. another book is by charles freeman, and it is a fascinating account of history in which he posits that the notions of christian orthodoxy and heresy really were composed not by church leaders, but by leaders of the state where the state directly intervened in convening councils of bishops and insisted on certain precepts of orthodoxy and from that flowed the concept of what constituted heresy. and it was the emperor thee doe sis in 1831 who really insisted on that, and it changed the course of history and not always for the better. it kind of silenced dissent, it squelched sort of intellectual ferment in the church about the competing theories of theology and led to the persecution of people who deviated from orthodoxy over the centuries. and so it's really a fascinating account of early christian history and the consequences that flowed from the actions of the emperor who ruled in constantinople but was a westerner originally. a wonderful new book called "the generals," the author of one of the best single sol yules on our invasion of iraq called "fiasco and what went wrong," brilliant book. this one is a historical book about sort of how generals were made, promoted and demoted from world war ii to the present. and what he, his thesis is, essentially, that george c. marshall who served as the army chief of staff and joint chiefs of staff under fdr during world war ii removed many, many generals from the battlefield if they weren't up to the job. he insisted on performance. sometimes his reassignments were something else and give them a second chance, but he with impunity he removed people until he found the right person for the right job. and what ricks talks about is that culture of responsibility has very much been diluted in subsequent periods such that by vietnam performance seemed to be very small criterion when it came to appraisal of generals. and there was very few consequences for poor performance and poor outcomes. he highlights general westmoreland who was in charge of the vietnam war effort for a very long period of time as a quintessential example of that, and he argues that right up to the present day the same is true and that it's very injurious to the performance of the u.s. military and has real implications in terms of u.s. defense and national security policy. definitely a controversial book and one that's very thought provoking and worth reading. another book i've recently read is a book called "the conservative assault on the constitution" by an attorney who practices before the supreme court named aaron -- [inaudible] and in this book he really documents the conservative assault on many facets of american life from education to civil rights to personal liberties to corporate law. and his theory is that this is a concerted ideological assault on liberty and on constitutional principles. and ironically, many of the books on the conservative side like to hold up the constitution and say we believe in the constitution. this actually makes the opposite argument, that they are endangering constitutional liberties and many of the precepts we care very much about as a country. thought provoking, very good book. then finally two books i have not yet read but i'm very excited about. one is "the guns of last light." it is the third book in the trilogy of world war ii and the american involvement in it. rick atkinson, formerly of "the washington post," a brilliant, human necessary sent writer. his first two volumes were extraordinary. the first one was a book on the north africa campaign and the american involvement in it. the second was the sicily and italy campaigns that went right up until 1945, very brutal part of the war that often gets overlooked. this third volume, "the guns at last light," is about -- chronicles our involvement from the invasion of normandy, d-day, right up to the liberation of bear run in 1945. -- berlin in 1945. so that's next on my list this summer to read. and then i was just sent a book my a colleague called "the founding rivals." this is a book about the rivalry between madison and monroe. it's sort of a little known piece of virginia history, but actually madison and monroe ran against each other for the united states congress. and the district had been carved to favor james monroe. madison decided to contest it, and in an upset he beat james monroe who, of course, was a friend of his, stayed a friend and succeeded him as president. so this is, this is quite an interesting book, and it contends that because madison won that election we got the bill of rights. otherwise maybe we wouldn't have gotten it, because madison was a great champion of that bill of rights. so this election had great consequences. it's not a well known piece of virginia history, but it's actually a critical piece of virginia history, and again, it's a book i very much look forward to reading this summer. >> let us know what you're reading this summer. tweet us @booktv, post it on our facebook page or send us an e-mail at booktv@c-span.org. >> are you interested in being a part of booktv's online book club? our selection this month is sheryl sandberg's book, "lean in: women, work and the will to lead." in "lean in" ms. sandberg, who is the coo of facebook, discusses why it's still difficult for women to achieve leadership roles in the eyes. she also talks about her own career choices and experiences. you can watch her talk about "leap in" at booktv.org, and as you read the book this month, post your thoughts on twitter with the hash tag btv book club and write on our facebook page, facebook.com/booktv. and then on june 25th at 9 p.m. eastern, join our live, moderated discussion on both social media sites. and if you have an idea for next month, send your suggestion on which books you think we should include in our online book club via twitter, facebook or e-mail at booktv@c-span.org. >> here's a look at some books that are being published this week. in "lincoln unbound: how an ambitious young railsplitter saved the american dream and how we can do it again," rich lowry, editor of "the national review," details lincoln's economic policies. carl hart, associate professor of psychology and psychiatry at columbia university presents his research on the relationship between addiction and the brain in "high price: a neuroscientist's journey of self-discovery that challenges everything you know about drugs and society." in "the great d generation: how institutions decay and economies die," historian niall ferguson argues that markets today are hindered by overcomplex regulations that render them increasingly incapable of supporting america's economic and political system. david lefter, director of the innovation and technology forum at new york university's polytechnic institute discusses how a group of founding fathers made the revolution a possibility by keeping the radicals from acting too fast in "the founding conservatives: how a group of unsung heroes saved the american revolution." and in "dollarocracy," journalist john nichols and robert mcchesney argue that media is putting americans in danger of being more open to manipulation. look for these titles in bookstores this coming week and watch for the authors in the near future on booktv and on booktv.org. >> well, back to the world turned upside down. you spent a lot of time in that book on israel, iraq and islam, and one of theisms that you talk about is islamism. the real reason the islamists have declared war on the west, that it embodies the freedom of the individual and the negation of theocratic authority in a globalized world, this freedom is viewed as a contagion that threatens islam everywhere. >> yes. well, this is, you know, an issue which has preoccupied me for several years and, obviously, preoccupies all of us more and more. and i do think, as i've said, that there is a problem here with the islamic world and with the religion at the root of that islamic world. and it's very, very important to understand, i think, in all this that when one talks about these concerns, one is not talking about all muslims. on the contrary, there are, i mean, speaking from the point of view of britain, there are very many muslims who have come as immigrants to britain precisely because they wanted to sign up to british and western values. they wanted to live in freedom. they wanted to prosper, they wanted to have good jobs. but they wanted to live in freedom because freedom's very important to them. ..