Value the similar later of tastes. You may disagree with the republican or democrat but youre still basically american and share the same culture and you know your side is half wrong. When you hae mentality of im half wrong and hes probably half right, it will be easier to come to an agreement. But if you have an eggotisticle at tiew tude of pim 100 right and hes 100 wrong, then its hard to come to an agreement and i think weve had a failure of modesty about our own rightness and wrongness. We conclude with the marks of genius at the Morgan Library with assistant curator John Mcquillen. I think it changes as we pass through the centuries from if an a chenet roman idea of genius being a sort of guardian spirit that everyone had, every man had his genius, every woman had her juno, to something more selective. 18th century authors, alexander pope, the great romantic poets thought genius was something only a select few could ever hope to cleave and whether given by nature or god, but it was a very selective thing that set them apart. Politics in america and genius at the Morgan Library when we continue. Theres a saying around here you stand behind what you say. Around here, we dont make excuses, we make commitments. And when you cant live up to them, you own up and make it right. Some people think the kind of accountability that thrives on so many streets in this country has gone missing in the places where its needed most. But i know youll still find it, when you know where to look. And by bloomberg. A provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Jon good evening. Im jon meacham filling in for charlie rose who is on assignment. We begin the program with a conversation about politics, in particular why a polarized washington seems incapable of action on issues ranging from immigration to entitlements. With fewer than 1,000 days left in office, president obama must govern with an Approval Rating around 40 . By comparison, at this point in their second terms, Ronald Reagan was at 63 , bill clinton at 62. Obamas current standing is roughly akin to that of george w. Bush who stood at 39 . Congress is even worse. Only 7 of americans say they have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the house and senate. An unpopular president , a desperately unpopular congress. Whats driving the disspiritting public discontent with washington . Joining me two incumbent lawmakers candid, joe manchin and jim cooper. Senator, you have been quoted saying that your worst day as governor is better than your best day as a senator. Why is that . Jon, i think if you base id on accomplishments, getting something done, and i think you and i spoke about this before, i was able to basically get up every morning excited as governor, knowing that i could change somebodys life and make it better for them in West Virginia. My beautiful state that i love so much. And ei could go to bed at night fulfilled i had done something productive. I dont get that same feeling now. But im very hopeful and it is still the place if youre going to change the world, being in congress and washington, d. C. Is the place to do it, weve just got to get our act together and act like americans and quit worrying about being democrats and republicans. Jon congressman, you have served in congress under five administrations from 1982 with a little break in there. Which was the most effective and what was it about that era that was missing now . Well, theres never a golden age, john, but there might have been a bronze age. The tip oneal era, in retrospect, was a pretty harmonious time because tip could sit down with president Ronald Reagan and get things done after hours. Thats almost no longer true today theres such acrimony, and were behaving more Like Parliament than congress because my colleagues 999 of the time with their Political Party affiliation. Joe and i sometimes break from our party. No party has monopoly on wisdom. Our main job is to do the right thing pore the country. Jon what is it, simply the personalities that you dont have a speaker or a president , or what are the other factors . Personalities are part of it, but also some larger forces. Weve gotten so darned good at gerrymandering with computers that these computers are preset to send people to washington and once they get there they dont know anybody because they dont live there and after the last vote we fly back home. The internet changed politics tremendously. Used to be when we had three news channels, we had a common set of facts to operate on. Whether youre watching fox or msnbc, you can see a different picture of america today. Whats never changed is human nature and common sense and thats what youre miss so much is the human contact, human interactions. Common sense. If i can go home to West Virginia and explain why im supporting something or why im looking at something differently, if i can explain it, i can vote for it, if it makes sense. If it doesnt, i cant. I dont care whether its a hard Party Line Vote they want me to take, whether it be democrat or whatever it may be, and the thing that ive said is basically were an environment, jim and riin an environment now and jim can basically give you the experience of history here being through five administrations, ive only been here through one administration, i dont know what five would have done to me, but, anyway, john, with that being said, i made a pledge dr. I have made a i have made a pledge to myself and every West Virginian thatly not campaign against a setting colleague. If you expect me to go out and beat up my colleagues who are republicans and who are running to go down in their states and get involved in their races, i wont do it. Jon senator, you came to National Prominence after the tragedy in newtown in connecticut as a democrats from West Virginia and someone who in a campaign ad who shot the cap and trade bill, coming out for some common sense gun legislation. Can you tell us what that experience taught you for good or for ill about whats happening . Well, i pretty much knew, you know all these personal issues, i come from a gun culture. Im a lifetime member of the nra, proud member. I shoot and love to go hunting and shooting and have friends ive done that with all my life, and with that i always felt common sense would prevail, and if i wanted to be treated as a lawabiding gun own, then just because you dont come from a gun culture, dont look at me as ive committed a crime because i own a gun. Maybe its a type of gun you dont want me to own. But i could say why do you have a car with 140 on the speedometer when the speed is only 70 . You have the right to buy what you want in america as long as you abide by the laws. Thats how i want to be looked upon as a law abiding gun owner. With that i thought game responsibility. We never put restrictions on personal traction actions. I want to sell or give jimmy gun, i can do it, dont need a background check. Law abiding person wont sell to a stranger or unstable person or even irresponsible family member. With all that, if i dont know you ant go to a commercial transaction such as a gun show or on the internet exchanging and trading guns that at least i ought to have a background check or a background check on you so i know who im selling it to . To me that made sense. If i want to be treated as a lawabiding gun owner with all the right and the second amendment, then i should be at least showing common sense about getting a background check when i dont know somebody. Jon well, you did this in a bipartisan way and it didnt work. Well, when you say it didnt work, you know, we had almost i think 60 votes on cloture. Then they said, oh, my goodness, this will pass. Then all the wheels started turning and people got scared and threatened and this and that. It takes an awful lot of work. I have been asked the question, do you wish you hadnt done it . Well, you know, if thats the case, why did you send me here . Why dont you just send somebody here that basically will do exactly what the path of least resistance would be and just go along to get along . I knew if i couldnt bring some expertise to a piece of legislation i knew an awful lot about, then what was my purpose . So it did take an awful lot of work and politically you take maybe a little bit of a hit, but i truly believe if you work hard enough, people will respond and get involved and penal are looking at me now do you know what the whole problem on that was, jon, on that . I said, did you read the bill . They said, no. We broke it down to one page. After they read it, they said, joe, we like your bell. I said, thank you. They said, we just dont trust government, thats why were not for it. They didnt trust government stopping there. I said, guys, this is a constitutional amendment, it has to go back through process. I can assure you we wont do anything different than what the bill says. We just dont trust government. Jon that ring strew . Oe was describing the sausage making process the legislature goes through. Its not pretty, just hope it tastes good when youre done. Moving into the polarization, were finding some people want pork, some want beef and they dont want to mix the two. So its very difficult to get a compromise. Joe was ideally suited to achieve a compromise on the gun issue. He tried hard. He didnt succeed because its hard for anyone to beat the National Rifle association. Some issues are difficult to solve and takes times. But there is so much more the congress could be doing. We should be humiliated were at 7 in the polls and should be doing Everything Possible to do better. Joe and i coapt bill called no budgets, no pay, which would eliminate congressional pay if we didnt pass that for a budget. We passed it for one year. The republicans limited it to a year. Now its expired. So now there wont be budgets for the United States of america. There are new approaches, like incentive pay, penalty pay, also gamey fying it, so if we got to pick the Committee Members that might change the cal clues. To an outsider, this is all way complicated and sounds like roberts rules of order or something. But this is the system the founders gave us and in the fourth of july weeks we should be obligated to make it work. And when we have funerals like senator howard baker who is one of the giants of our time, to be sure a short giant, he knew how to get along and will go down in history as one of the greatest and todays leaders are not measuring up. If we followed the examples of the recent past, we could do better. Joes idea about not campaigning against colleagues would be helpful. You cant just have unilateral disarmment, they have to agree to the same thing. Some people say when bill frist attacked tom daschle, that was one of the first times the senate got off rails and personally attacked each other, making comedy very hard. Jon when you talk to people in the white house about these issues, they bring up something jim mentioned a while ago which is a letle lack of a common audience and a common fact base in which you could have Something Like the fdr, the reagan going into the country, explaining things, even, god help us, ross perot, have a charge, a teachable moment, do you think that kind of president ial leadership is possible in this environment . I think so. Dont you, jim, think people are hungry for that . They are hungry for it, but also we are at fault. We make the presidency almost an impossible job. Even as an historian, there was never an easy time for an american president. Thomas jefferson didnt have it easy. Andrew jackson didnt have it easy. Now we make it almost impossible because youre damned if you do or dont. If people could remember harry truman, he was vilified yet made some of the wisest Foreign Policy and domestic policy decisions in history and only in retrospect do we see his greatness. Look today, it would be common sense to pass an infrastructure bill, but because of not wanting to raise any taxes, senator corker is the only republican i know of willing to break with orthodoxy. So it used to be common sense for congress to pass highway bills. Weve really blown it for a long time. We havent had a real highway bill for seven years. Thats crippling for the country and the presidency, too, but its not his fault. Right. Immigration is very important right now. Its reaching a level of humanitarian crisis in california, texas. Whats the hope for congressional action in terms of addressing this with some dispatch . Senator . In the senate, we passed a bipartisan immigration bill which basically said secure your borders first. Those people who have been here and came here illegally will pay their fines, get in the back of the line and go through a process. There was no amnesty there whatsoever, and its something that i think it was a Good Building block for us to work off of. Were just asking our friends on the house side, both the republicans and our democratic friends, to look at this. And lets bring this up, with what you see the influx now of these young people coming from all over south america. Something has to be done. Weve got to secure these borders. Weve got to make sure that were able to do it in a systematic way thats fair but also manageable, and right now its not. And you cant do it without Immigration Reform, thinking you have 11plus Million People here who came here illegally and youre going to round them all up and throw them out, we cant even stop the ones coming here just recently and get them turned around to go back. Were having a hard time there. I think, jim, that was the 2008 law that was passed, and thats what henry and i are working on right now, seeing if we can eliminate and we peel that piece of legislation and repeal that piece of legislation and treat all the noncontiguous countries the same as mexico and canada and get them back to their home country within a 48hour period. Joes exactly right, comprehensive Immigration Reform passed the senate and thats a miracle but the house of representatives wont even allow a vote. They are so afraid of alienating the ultraconservative base during primaries they arent willing to consider it and even after the eric cantor defeat theyre more paranoid. But i have a semifunctional senate and completely dysfunctional house, and if they were to allow a vote it would pass and be solved, but they wont allow a vote because its internal republican politics. Theyre worried about the Tea Party Wing and folks like mario arubio are having a hard time. Im asking about senator manchins potomac hospitality and whether you have been drinking with him on the potomac river. No laughter jon senator, do you have a house boat is this. I live on the potomac. I couldnt come to investing in real estate in d. C. It wasnt many my dna. I said, i just cant do it. I told my wife, im going to buy a boat, then when things get crazier than now, i can float away and no one will notice the difference. The main thing, its been a great thing for us to have an evening to get a few senators together, four, five, six, eight, even more at times, and i try to get a balance of democrats and republicans, and people from what you would think of one end of the spectrum to another. One night we had telemarket and ted cruz, a beautiful evening. I know tom and ted looked at me both my friends and before i knew it, you couldnt separate the two from conversation, and we dont get that type of opportunity here. So we have to make every minute count. Jon senator manchin, congressman cooper, thank you. Thank you, jon. Jon appreciate it. We continue our conversation about politics and polarization with president ial historian Michael Beschloss who joins me from washington and in new york david brooks of the new york times. Welcome to you both. Myel, wanted to start with you. Weve just talked to senator manchin, congressman cooper. Theyre in the arena trying to make things work. How do you see this moment in historical comparison in terms of polarization . Well, you know, jon, i think one way of looking at it is, if it were a perfect system, then the most polarized congress would be at the post polarized times of American History, like the run up to the civil war, perhaps in 1940 and 1941 when americans were struggling, whether we should go to war against hitler and the Imperial Japanese or not, and i hate to say it, but if you had to look at what was done in congress in those times compared to now, i think the congress of 2014 does not measure up very well. Thats remarkable. So we were better off in was more Productive Legislature in the 1850s . Well, they disagreed, but i think there was not such a habit of just disagreeing almost out of custom. The reflective partisanship is on the rise. Sure, around there were not a lot of members of congress who were terrified that if they took a position that was not, you know, extreme enough that they would get primaried, which is a word that, thank god, was not used in the 1860s. Sometimes what david does is party tricks is he sub jew gaits the word to primary. I gave him the word primarily. Jon do you agree . We go through cycles. You know, i think the 1860s, if you look at some of the campaigns against lincoln, pretty polarized. Statistically the cycle started in the 70s and we should be pulling out of it if you look at rough historical patterns of 30 years. What prevents us from pulling out is strictly institutional. If you go to a dinner party in washington, on the left is academic, donor and think tanks so they have an infrastructure on the left. On the right, donors, thing tanks, academics, infrastructure on the right. If you go to dinner in the middle, its lobbyists. Theres just a void. If youre a politician and want to heado the middle, theres nobody there. If you deviate from the right or left, theres punishment, so we have an institutional problem. I agree with david. I think it is institutional, but i would say that through history, the way we pull out of a period like this in terms of the intense hostility wean the two parties in congress has been, god forbid, overwhelming foreign or economic or social crisis in the country that causes everyone to essentially say lets knock it off and you go back over the last 15 years, in the wake of 9 11, there was a little bit of an effort to pull together. Same thing after the crash of 2008, very brief, but even those huge crises, not too much sign theres going to be a Great Potential for a change in washington at least in the next few years. One of the questions is polarization in washington or in the country. So i used to think it was mostly in washington. If you look at the latest research from pe pugh and other organizations, it looks like much more in the country than i thought it was. Views are diverging, people in the middle are checking out. If you look at the promising young people at universities, they want to get something done, so they get away from politics or hitting politics at the local level. Theyre much less excited about politics at the national level, so the people who would defeat polarization are selfcensoring themselves and getting away from washington and going to work in chattanooga or someplace like that. Jon you live in washington. If you were pulling apart the sociology, what do you think the causes are . Its built into the system as david was saying that it was not for most of American History. Fake the house of representatives. If you were elected to the house and wanted to be leader, the way you would do it for most of American History is to prove you were able to make deals with im on the other side of the aisle. How do we think jerry ford or bob michael got to be leaders of their party in the house . Not because they were ideological firebrands, it was the opposite. In the next 20 years, if you want to become leader of the house, the John Boehners wont be around much longer, and perhaps the best advice to someone who wants to is be intense in ideological point of view, raise a lot of money, and that wasnt true for most of our history. Three things changed institutionally. Passing legislation has become much less important as michael says because much less is being passed. Theres tremendous emphasis because of the media of being a tv performer rather than legislature, and sarah palin was the ultimate version of this, but i think ted cruz more interested in the body less interested in stands for future reference. Second, donors tend to be more polarized than other people, so thats where the money is, observe right and left. Finally, democracy. Weve become much more open, less democratic, more republican. Government should have some lack of trance parentsy, the same reason middle aged people should wear clothes, you dont want to see everything. Responding to telegrams and emails makes people more responsive. Its multicause. All of the things lead to polarization. To me, the only way out is foreign crisis, an invasion from mars, quite likely, or leadership. People are sick of it. The members are sick of it. I think obama tried. If had more social oomph or hadnt come in at the time of crisis. Jon do you see something changes . I agree the way that david listed things might change and i think there is another one and that is money. Right now, as long as money is essential to the political process, i dont think it will change, even if you have leaders as noble as wellintentioned as the ones david is talking about. For most of American History, there was not a need for enormous Campaign Funds mainly because there was not tv. And it is entirely possible if you imagine it that there could be a future not too long from now when tv is not the way that a political candidate, its not cheap way he or she tries to get his or her message across. It may be other areas of the internet or other things that dont cost so much money. If thats the way, you dont have to raise all the Campaign Funds, money becomes less important and, therefore, you have fewer people who are elected in office and trying to be, sending out letters saying nancy pelosi or Mitch Mcconnell is satan because thats the way you raise money. Or right now the money is on the exchange. Its possible to imagine a world in which people run money from the center, which doesnt have to be the mushy middle. It can be a combination of left and right ideas that create a balance. So you could actually get a leader who decides im tired of the Koch Brothers or the comparable people on the left dictating where the money is, im going to create centric institutions, and im seeing michael over my shoulder, and im talking to mayor bloomberg. Or people like him. One of the Amazing Things to me in history is is there is an absolute opening for independent candidate to run for president. In 1992, ross perot was running ahead of bill clinton and george bush the elder. The amazing thing to me, given the kind of money people in this century have, its not happened again. Right now were cruising toward the clinton and jeb bush race. I think both campaigns are weaker than they appear and the country is wanting change. You can see ted cruz and Elizabeth Warren type figure on the other and that creates an opening. You still have the house of representatives problem if a centrist is running. But i think both parties are moving toward the edges and there is a natural room in there for a weak party which is what this country needs. Jon michael, historically, is there an example where this kind of new center has been created . Well, what the history of Party Realignment is that a party develops to fill the void thats been left by others. You know, david was talking about the wig party. Thats how the Republican Party started in the mid 1850s, so you could see that again. But i think what we might see is something that again is different for most of American History and that is if theres a Movement Like this or a candidate, that person may not be the head of a party at all. Jon so we have the possibility, the technology exists, certainly the public discontent, congress has a 7 Approval Rating and most congressmen say we cant figure out who the 7 are. Relatives and friends. Jon exactly, and on the payroll. But it takes, as we all know michael wrote a book called president ial courage which is about individual action, it takes a person to do this. Outside of mayor bloomberg, the kind of names in the recent past that floated around, we talked about in the last 30 years, lee iacoccas name has been up and around, and others, but does someone come out of business or the acam my . Where do they come from . The media. I think former newsweek editors. laughter david is excluding himself, i see. My bakes view is my basic view is people want to know is what your character and where did you establish it and did you establish it in an institution in which we have faith. And i doubt a business person really can do it. I think it would have to be, in general, people have faith in the military, and very few institutions. So it would have to be somebody comes out of the blue with some leadership and management skills. If you got a boring enough person, a business person who was exceptionally boring, because i think the model unked look for is, im not charismatic, im not going to yoi you hope and change or compassionate conservatism, im not bill clinton, im just a boring guy that will make it work. Former governor Mitch Daniels from indiana would have been a good republican candidate because he is 56, low to the ground, built in touch with the people, but not super charismatic. He just managed to run things. And i think there would be an opening for that kind of candidate as opposed to an antipolarizing one. Jon do you agree . I do. But you could say there is an opening for someone like this, then where are they . The thing that depresses me about this whole conversation, what were saying is the best way to get out of this is for some miraculous person to come in and save us. And the founders would be horrified because their whole idea beginning with James Madison was you dont allow the American Public to rest on this, you make sure that theres a system that works so that youre not dependent on the usual moment of, you know, someone like this coming along. Jon it was an epitaph to the american bon bone bonapart e person like this on horse back. The character of the American People is the constitution. If the country itself is irreconcilably polarized, then in classic republican lower case r thinking, that is going to be reflected by the nature of the republicans. And im come around to that view which i was resistant to over the past ten years and many people argued it is in the country and not in washington, and i think i more or less accept that and i think its a moral failing we share which is if you have a modest sense of your own rightness and you think politics is generally a competition between half truths, then you will need the other people on the other side and you will value the similar later of tastes. You may disagree with the republican or the democrat but youre basically still american and share the same culture and you know your side is half wrong. If you have that mentality of im half wrong hes probably half right, then its goismght be easier to come to an agreement. But if you have an owingtisticle attitude that im 100 right and theyre 100 wrong, with is i a moral failing, then its very hard to come to an agreement, and i do think weve had that failure of modesty about your rightness and wrongness. Im in the oped business and i have contributed as much as anybody to this moral failure but i think it built gradually and has been somewhat consuming. Jon one of our joint favorite writers George Elliott talked about moving through the world of dim lights and tangled circumstance, which isnt a point that raises much money online. And i wanted to defend president obama on one thing. He said Foreign Policy is about hitting singles and doubles. Sometimes thats what politics is, boring through crooked boards. We have such an heroic attitude that when it doesnt turn out heroically, were disillusioned and think its crap, but its neither. Its just staying afloat and hitting a couple of singles and doubles. Jon michael, assess the validity of this statement, has richard hose steaders style in american politics gone main stream . No, i think he meant for that to refer to American History in one thread but i think one element is true and that is one point he was making was we live in a political system based on tolerance and based on, for instance, in congress, relationships between people who disagree, and one of the central elements in all of this is that what youd want in a president , what youd want in members of congress is not someone who says, gee, i agree with everyone, and lets suppress our differences, but what you want is someone with a degree of imagination to understand why someone on the other side might have a point of view even if you do not agree. Classic example, you know, Lyndon Johnson and everett dirksen, fellow leaders of congress in the 1950s, disagreed about just about everything but they could get Business Done because l. B. J. And he could at least understand why an intelligent, moral human being could have the views each of them did. Jon just one moment in history crucial happened in early 61, j. F. K. Gave a utopian inaugural speech, we can bear any burden, pay any price, cure any disease, farm the deserts. So lets march. Three days before eisenhower gives his farewell speech, says poll things is competition between interests, and the key word in eisenhower speech is balance. So id say in the early 60s with this coming generation of leaders, we gave away the sense that politics is about balance and its about solutions and energy and heroic utopianism. And once we leapt into that world which created the reagan revolution, the obama hope and change, we leapt into utopian politics which was bound to be frustrating and all capital letters. But if you keep it small letters like eisenhower meant, youre in a world where its only politics, not crucial things in life family, faith and sports so you have a more modest sense and more flexible about it. Jon so the rise of the managerial culture, the best and the brightest, that is the attitude that gave us vietnam. Well, people have the sense they could be transformed through politics, and a lot of us spend a lot of time thinking about politics, but if youre looking for salvation in politics, youre barking up the wrong tree. Its the loss in faith in a lot of things and the belief in faith of politics which gave us the russian evolution on a larger scale but in the smaller scale the sense that, you know, the 2008 Obama Campaign had come along, and im as guilty as anybody about this, and you get caught up in the fervor of the thing and, when that fervor doesnt come through, youve got this emotional crash of disillusionments and i think were living through that as well. Jon im sure michael will know exactly, but i think there was a scottish traveler in the 1820s who came to do a travel book in the francis trial of era. He said there was more interested in the apostle than the gospel and the personality was, already, then, too much focus on that. The irony is thats what the founders were terrified of because they were so worried about a president who was too powerful especially in making war. They spent an awful lot of time and attention to make sure to make sure that you didnt have a president who could get the country into wars on his own for all sorts of reasons just like the monarchs and dictators of europe they were trying to get away from. So, you know, again, one advantage of saying what the founders would think now is its very hard ever to be proven wrong, but i think that is something that they would be very anxious about. Except for hamilton. laughter as a sign of grace and love, ill let you have the last word on hamilton. Thank you, michael. Thank you, david. Thanks, jon. Jon we conclude this evening with a look at the Morgan Librarys marks of genius exhibit. Genius is one of the most fascinating and Mysterious Forces in human endeavor. The word deriving from latin verb to bring into being, create, produce, and from magna carta, to newton to a lock et of mary shelly, it explores the notion of genius as it evolved through the ages. Features 60 rare books, manuscripts from oxfords library. Joining me is John Mcquillen assistant curator of the Morgan Library museum in new york city. Welcome. Thanks for having me on the show. Jon definegenius for us. Thats the tough one. Thats what the exhibit tries to accomplish. I think it changes, as we have passed through centuries, from the ancient roman idea of genius being a sort of guardian spirit that everyone had, every man had his genius, every woman had her juno, to something that has become much more selective. 18th century authors alexander pope, the great romantic poets, thought genius was something only a very select few could ever hope to achieve and whether given by nature or god, it was a very selective thing that set them apart. Jon and did it require public expression that is, the distinction between pub acheland private genius, as it evolved, a very 18th century idea to present onesself to the world in a certain way . Yes. I think well, coming from a book museum in the book side of things, the publication of material is what then history will tell you makes you a genius or not, and history will then ultimately be the judge on no matter if you think you are or not, history will let you know and decide that for themselves. Jon lets sort with someone who did public books, william shakespeare. The first follow which is in the exhibition 1623. The first major publication of shakespeares plays, a few little ones came out a few years before in small sort of pamphlet, small book size. This was the first major publication of any plays in the english language in a large, basically encyclopedia, large dictionary format. This is a major reference tome and it really creates plays as a part of the literary cannon. Jon who was the publisher. Two of his former colleagues at the playhouse, after shaings spears death, took it upon themselves to preserve his plays and worked at publishing them and, so, had to get the scripts of his plays that were known, some of the published editions already produced, and some of the actors together to recite from memory the plays they didnt have scripts for to then reconstitute things, which like prom owe and juliet romeo and juliet would have been lost had it not been for the first folio. We only know those because of the first folio. Jon not unlike the bible and how they were doing it. Jane austin purely a point of personal privilege because shes my favorite novelist but you have the First Edition of pride and prejudice . We do. Its a copyright library, so they are entitled to a copy of every work printed in the united kingdom. When austin was published, the bobbians had to go back and repurchase their works. We also have one of her rare manuscripts for work she never completed, an its a manuscript in two sections, and the morgan owns part of the manuscript and the bodlian owns the rest of it. In the early 20th century, jp morgan, i think in 1924, if im not mistaken, was able to purchase part of the manuscript at auction and tried desperately with the austin heirs to get the rest of the work, and they would never sell it. The section thats now at the baudrlean went through hands and came to auction in s so in soth. The baudline was able to acquire it for themselves. Between the two institutions, they shared the jane austin manuscript. There are only a couple of hers left, but really real gems of the exhibit to see jane austins hand, her work in front of you. Jon and the idea she was sitting in that corner of the parsonage, writing, the family around. And the genius, theyre writing, things flow magically from the pen and comes out perfectly on paper. The jane austin manuscripts, the shelly manuscripts, they work at it. Theyre moving words and phrases around, mary shellys frankensteins manuscript, you can see percy shellys corrections, and some suggestions in between the lines. So its interesting when you think of then, you know, the original authors work, you know, if its originally what they intended or what came from the pen or how they change it or how someone else might change it. Jon which is one problem we have now, if there are geniuses at work. Theyre heavily edited. Jon and theyre computerized. So its going to be trickier to get to see the progress of a manuscript centuries hence. It is. There is some interesting work, a sort of hard drive archeology, if you will, and going back through time stamps and when the computer automatically saves drafts of things, you can go back, i believe its i could be wrong but i think emory has john updikes computers and all his disks and materials, and you can go back to go through and see how he changed things. From arguably the most intelligent english novelist to the apocalypse, tell us about the engraving. The great german renaissance artist created this work. There are fullpage web cuts of a story of apocalypse, the final book of the christian bible. A popular work throughout the middle ages and renaissance period, the work was originally published in 1498 in a latin and German Version with his large scale wood cuts. There are about 15 in the work that illustrate the texts and here youre seeing the four horsemen of the apocalypse, one of the most if not the most famous of the work. Albert took the art of the wood cut to heights that it still hasnt been surpassed. What were very rudimentary outline figures in earlier german and european wood cuts, he brings shading to and light and so much detail and space through just the carving of the wood. Jon and that was for, to go back to what we were talking about, popular expression. That was for reproduction . Yeah, he intended these always to be mass produced. He was in charge of the printing and publication of this work. He has a couple of large series like this, one the life of the virgin that sort of goes through the life of the virgin mary, and then one just on the passion of christ. He had all three produced in 1511, and this edition that we have in the exhibition is the 1511 edition that comes with the entire life of the virgin series and the large passion in one giant tome. And i think it is, in my opinion, one of the first artists books. Theres little text with passion oand the life of the virgin. The text on the apop lips is on the back of the image. So you cant read the text and look at the image. You have to absorb one, then you can turn the page and see the story. So he really preferenced the images over the text. Jon theres an anglican theologian dubose which was once asked what do you make to have the book of revelation, and he replied, i have no idea. One of the few honest responses. Its a hard thing to wrap your head around sometimes. Jon handel. You have the original conducting score of the messiah. Which he used at the dublin premiere in 1492 and the next dozen. He had the original score and this is the manuscript his copyist john smith produce ford him to use for the rehearsals, for the performance. And he goes through and you can see he changes not major changes but shortens some pieces, changes a little bit of the phrasing, changes some notes based on some performers available to him, musicians there, what he can and cant do at each venue. But as a working manuscript and the thing he changed and actually used repeatedly for performances, its kind of just an amazing performance object. Jon which raises one question about genius that we both use the word in the past few minutes cannonnicle. There is an act of genius thats interpretive of a classic, and its a whole different tributary coming off that initial river. And there are a lot of people, innumerable authors, musicians, artists that are fantastic, but, you know, history, whether they have an actual role to play in the future, have any emphasis on future generations and creation, i think thats where at least historically we start to say the genius comes in. We still, every year, go to umpteen productions of messiah. Were still reading jane austin, shakespeare. T therthere are a ton of peopleo are great but we dont, sadly, speak of anymore. Jon which is an act of curation. Curation and preservation. Jon talamay, 1486. He took known authors, talking about geography and compiled them into a text. He, as far as we know, didnt make maps, those come later after his text. In 1486, these printed maps, theyre about the fifth printed version after talamay after the gutenberg bible in 55, talamay was printed multiple times. And this work, you can see on the map, you be have the standard idea of what we have for the Northern Hemisphere now he figured out how to take the globe and put it in a twodimensionalle map. He created climate zones, we call them. But sort of the tropic of cancer, the equator, and orients the Northern Hemisphere at the top of the globe and puts it up above but also thought the southern tip of africa connected to asia which made the indian ocean kind of like a large lake, and it was only the great arabic geographer who said, no, this is completely open water and africa and asia do not connect. Jon still, not too bad. No. And the amazing thing is that this book, within the library of ferdinand and isabella of spain, and produced in 1486, and in 1495, they gave it as president to the venetian ambassador. So its kind of amazing to think that this book or another copy they might have had might have played a role in Christopher Columbus journey across the ocean. This is a wonderful exhibition. John mcquillen, thank you. Thank you very much. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org a kqed television production. Its sort of like old fishermans wharf. It reminds me of old san francisco. And youd be a little bit like jean valjean, with the teeth, whatever. And worth the calories, the cholesterol, and the heart attack you might have. Its like an adventure, you know. Youve got to put on your miners helmet. It reminds me of oatmeal with a touch of wet dog. I did. Inhaled it. People when they say sommelier or something