Of her dying father said he is treated as a great hero and taken to fancy dinners by stockbrokers and men ofmi finance and women are swarming around him bodily is he very happy about that but writing letters to hisou wife telling her he needs toto raise his value in her eyes and she also loves the attention of men and occasionally she would put that in his face also so there were times when i personally came to thele conclusion one of the reasons why he was courtmartialed or why he took those actions that led to the Court Martial is it was part of the of growing crisis in his marriage he may have had an affair or dangerous flirtations and ultimately he saved that to go back to her and she recognized that as a sacrifice and accepted it. So later her literary executor cup for two different collections and he wrote in 1869 about how they had a huge fight and his gambling addiction was a problem but it speaks to his emotional sensitivity i can tell for a long time that he said the things which didnt mean it so heres a guy who was full of flaws he isnd y cldeed the the yen alsoet closely attuned to his wife and shows why they got over the crisis he keeps creating in their partnership is fascinating because one question is was he planning on running for president . Know. Because she forbade it during the civil war she was the political liaison onon on capitol hill and do that these drug congressmen weree fawning all over her and she rode of one who said he is a corrupt drug but of mind he is a very nice man and to work with him per car she was a realist but she said after a merger or aree running for congress it is a snake pit is a job for professionals she was a woman of the world sorry her relationship with the wiser brown how they were friends but struggled these are real human beings with real lives that in a way people could be more generous and a lot of that is right on the page she talks about these tensions you dont have too go very far to see her writing about it and she is the beautiful 34 yearoldst of widow that devotes the rest of her life as Franklin Roosevelt is president when she dies to celebrating her husband and goes on the lecture circuit and ends up on park avenue. That is something we think of them as western figures but yet custer himself when he wrote his account in his memoir of braha owe it is a blizzard in you cannot see farther than broadway he deliberately identify some self simultaneously as an urban sophisticates it and they always had their lives wrapped around that polarization. If you have any questions , lineup we will take those of the last 15 minutes that we have. A better light supper we will keep talking. [laughter] how you balance literaryry technique to keep the story moving as well issued do with the historical record. That is a long and complicated question i believe a biography a half stus succeed as a book and thought through fully aversive my motto is to havey to give a the reader a reason to read every page. Ge. Why to the one to continue . To find out what happens or to understand but keep pulling them through so i want to explain the meaning of his life but it has to be part of the propulsion mechanism by want them to be invested in the story that it comes out of food they are as characters so it isnt just a random things a like history one thing after another but that there is of lot at stake the way america is changing and yet human strugw lives with personal struggles and flaws andard. Motivations to drive everything forward my drive isnt be a historian but to write to a full and complete book to give you that experience when they put it down the almost feel they have lived his life. Lake camp or hate him it is a compelling story all the way through. You have succeeded nowant t question. I want to ask a question about the jesse james book but it continues on to the present work and maybe the future. The central thesis seems to be the battle at that time was the last battle of the civil war so do you care to ruth speculate if it took place the other night int chicago . [laughter] i am being facetious but not really because i wondered if you saw or read going with your books with oppose civil war the america that in my opinion is still going on. Yes. Is a moment to restore to grapple with those questions that are essential to what america is about and the greatest achievements in this country, out not just a mite and people but thatug when we have great struggles some of the worst aspects of American History though arduously voting nation on earth. And we had a huge war around t the issue of slavery with the abolition and and within a few years of dread scott the theyre not fully human and they have no rights. A few years later yet blackyove senators and congress and that is amazing but yet not a Straight Line of progress so these issues the definition of food is an american goes through dramatic change even though there is a retreat there is a larger role in American History is how we argue about it so arguing by immigration with muslims innstat the United States is the same thing you cannot say the enslaved people or the kkk that murdered women anddtheo children in their homes that anybody who goes to a donald trump proudly is the same thing but the stress over the of threats as peoples people perceive them versus people who say the whole point of america is an idea of citizenship these are ideal says Sen Jesse James in custers wife are right at the center so i will not sit here i have my own politicalal views but i will not implement them but i do think these issues although not exactly the same but those tensions still play out always in a different way bet as the struggles go back to that era. I would imagine the might references at least 3,000 could be intimidating for research but if you were a modern historical biographer looking forward which you the envy or be relieved that the plethora of information to assimilate withal of videos and facebook posted articles out there . There in trying to imagine how you could imagineer getting your hands wrappedai around modern history with all the Information Available with tons and tons and how you may get through that with the message of the perspective to offer something unique to analyze that situation. With custer at a more traditional experience a lot like the story of the drunk who comes home puts his car in the driveway and makes a lot of ways outside the wife comes to the door is always the man who is the drunk. [laughter] and says were you doing . He said i dropped my keys she said theyre obviously not here were to drop them . But the lights is better here that is where he is looking. [laughter] so drawn to subjects and with custer got some more of back because the collections of his letters i got to dig into big piles of letters but with vendor built by have the taste of the modernle world to find out why clinton has a big biography nobody hates himself enough with it is tons of stuffo big scattered so now they try to digitize newspapers so i would search for every reference to vanderbilt andd would find out how many pieces of property were for sale and what a storied career fault the interval had so people worry all the Digital Media will have nothing to work with but it is the opposite we will be day wished with all of the debt that is hard to sort through. And you have to find ways to narrow the search and it will be impossible to search for everything so with custer i had to search for a are and even custard and even in sheridan in the spellings were off. I cannot tell you how much i appreciate that i you have described in my a chosen profession as full of jokes. [laughter] and it is pretty correct. [laughter] afternoon spoke earlier how even though he was not well liked he was wellrespected. At the how large were those reverberations after they received a notice . And with that regard to be massacred at little big horn how did the War Department change fighting in the west with the westward expansion . Interestingly with custer he was well liked by a lot of people one of the difficult things after the civil war immediately he starts to do a thing that creates a mess for himself that is part of the fun of writing about him sometimes you like jim and his toys creating one disaster after another and that is very much custers wife and very much after the civil war so when he got himself deeper in the whole to become more morally ambiguous or even reprehensible the struggle is to keep for the reader why people did like jim so people hated him personally but they always loved him so that dual natures hard to keep in mind there have been books written about the aftermath of little big horn but there was a real scramble to be brilliant in a lot of bad image being reckless started immediately after the war sheridan and grant said he was reckless and did these things even though as i posted on my publication pages last telegram to the commander of custers column said reliance your own column for your success the hopi indians hold together you have enough troops in this was the expectation but what was in the war after was the dogged pursuit because the lakota and cheyenne had to sustain themselves that is why we could not sustain himself into gathers supplies even though of gettysburg was decisive it would have been demoralizing but constant pressure is what brought them down in the end of the big battlefield success. It was just pulling the troops to find wrote innovative thinking that isse all interesting with a fewe, ma individuals many knew each other is say incredible story and is always good history. Just a military opinionhat ha and in those to make a difference. Arabia she referred to a man who spent more years. The way i would guess that is what the mistakes the meeting could have done things differently but you have had only the unprecedented numbers of lakota and cheyenne the also just one in the offensive thttle so theyre incredibly confident for tactical andir spiritual leadership in the act completely different than they had every reason to expect. So you can argue with yet the conditions in the determination with a completely different picture but it is remarkable. And then to sympathize with the struggle and defeat. You cane and then they take that viewpoint. T forget and that is diminishing. That was the best united festiv had stick thanks for coming to the tucson festival of books. [applause]booth signing books in the bookstore tent right outside tho cspan. Org. His book between the world and me describes his book as a black man in a america. Tanehisi coates discusses his book in brooklyn new york. This is one hour. [inaudible conversations] high in the chair of journalism at st. Josephsscoll college i welcome you to the College Next Year will be the 100th anniversary. [applause] anticipated clearly one of the most anticipated even as we havecentr had in that century. At one day [laughter] and want to say very quickly backed one day you can be a delivery man before you know, it you can become world famous author so i bring up the coowner of the bookstore who will introduce tonights event. [applause] good evening i am jessica b angrier so pleased to be hosting tonight in brooklyn. [applause]ght. He will be speaking tonight and were so grateful for his partnership with st. Josephs college allows we to bring you these events we have had a great seasonoo already in this year were looking at more events this fall and october 21st alsou can another on november 12 you can get the information on the green light. Com just a few housekeeping things please silence your cellphone and no photography a during the event you should already have received. Your copy additional copies are available for sale throughout the evening there is no book signing tonight but all copies have been note presigned so please note index cards were passed around before we started a few hot day question right it on the card we willllwould collect those for question is to be answered at the end of the event wave your hand if you did not get one and we will bring you one. This is being recorded byam cspan and booktv as well as live stream to those students on campus i had a whole great introduction written in he said youre not allowed to say that. [laughter] some of the president and editor in chief of the mantic the National Correspondent for the lentic and author of between the world and has recently received a macarthur fellowship. [applause] we just found out this evening he has won the kurtis prize tonight. [applause] so now ill let him speak for himself the rest of the evening. [applause]you jess hello. They akio to safe joseph st. Joseph for convening yes i thank you want to make a statement . It is my manifesto. [laughter] i want do talk about why i wrote between the world andd ths me why i signed those 900 books. [laughter] but there was a young lady that i remembered from 20 years ago that worked in a 20 bookstore in d. C. And i worked there one summer literally 20 years ago as a horrible looks seller. [laughter] an awful bookseller you can only love books so much to be a good book seller because if you love them under deeply interested in fact, you tend not to Pay Attention to things like shoplifters. [laughter] i was a very good i did that summer but i had a 30 discount and i would spend about 30 percent of my check on books so as to get to see sophie and i was looking at the book that they had a nice saw this book that was so important to me it is called the country between us i might of been 18 and i was surrounded by this Great Community and she was such a beautiful writer she wrote in such a way i did not understand everything she was saying but the pace and in the inkster and even the violence now reminded me asifieh something that i deeply identified and she wrote in such a way that i would read her poetry award not understand why she was saying but i would think about and go to bed thinkingnd d about it and i would wake up and in weeks later i would think about it i will just read a quick poll because i was so moved our promise it will only take one second to. So i tend to advocate for poetry by the way. [applause] there are not enough funds in the world i would make everybody write poetry. E spent spending young person with a period of time that the world was turned upside down teaching m. I. T. And writing it is called of colonel with the unnamed military official in what you have heard is true. To carry a of a trade of sugar this the runoff for the night. Rd the mood was swinging bear the television was an english broken bottles were imbedded or to cut his hands on the window those like the liquor store he had dinner rack of lamb the maid brought mangoes and the type of bread i enjoyed the country there was a commercial in spanish his wife to tell everything away there is some talk then of how difficult it had been the colonel told it to shut up and pushed himself from the table my friend said to me with his size say nothing but colonel returned with a sack used to bring pressure s is home and put many human years on the table there were like dried peach halves. There is no other way toto save this he should get our face and dropped into a water glass he came alive i am tired of fooling around tell your people they can go speefifteen themselves. Then he caught the scrapping of his voice and they were pressed to the ground. So i read this and that brutality in the poem with all the imagery there was no other way to say this there is no kind way there is nos no w hopeful way through is no way to make people feel good about themselves and when i got out of my it entire study approach it is the job of the writer to say things in truthful and direct ways that we believe the sin puzzling places that make us sad sometimes one of the questions that i get that people raise about the book that is not a whole full enough or to inspire blackck people does not leave themul with the way out or a way for word and maybe itat but doesnt i could argue about that but i wanted to talk about the defense of writing and literature and art to create a piece of art should we have that desire erred to reflect reality . To be tray and experience the most beautiful way that you can . The desire to write something that makes peoplethe e feel good at the end of the day than is a daytime story that allows you to tuck your. Children in at night that inspires people to be better people as a strictat is motivation is so far away from why i wrote this book i wrote a beautiful work of art that represented my relationship to my son in relationship to my country i dont know why i felt so moved to tell you thatlt tonight but i did so now we can proceed. [applause] i feel like you covered everything. [laughter] alaska few questions we will explore some of the themes from the book i thought we should start with is the one is the theme ofouldn violence and if you wouldnt mind reading a bit of your own work to start us off . Sure. Politi this is the beginning of my political consciousness and about 12 for 13 years old and i am becoming aware some of the troubles of my experience in my neighborhood to greater conflicts and problems with the country that i livein and i am told all my life but now i beginning to feel andn it and see for myself not to something we parents tell me. Now was the question that begins burning in me the materials were all around me in the form of books assembled. Then working at Howard University at the Research Center one of the largest collections of africana in the world your grandfather loved books and does to this day they were all over the house black people by black people boxed up in the basement o local capt. In the black Panther Party we read read about the oldd Party Newspapers i was attracted to the guns because they seemed honest they seem to address this country with the police in the language i compare the panthers to the heros given to me at the schools ridiculous and contrary to everything that i knew everyd io february we would go into assemblies for the Civilrights Movement our teachers urged us to let the freedom watching free riders and we cannot pass without a films dedicated to the glories of being beaten on camera the black people seem to love the worst things in life of what representative to their children apart the teargassed the fire hosesth that would tear off their clothes and put him in the street there would seem to w love the men that read to them love the children who would spit on them in the terrace to bond them wire they showing this to us . Nly our why are only a our heros nonviolent . But with this since of the special need of this morality back then all iba could do was measure them by what i knew measuring against children in terrorist wielding extension cords by judge then against the country that i knew inmies n the country whose army is out across the world to extend their dominion with civilization in secure how could this schools with a society actively scored incentives into the streets of baltimore knowing all they know to speak of nonviolence . Maybe you should give a little context you right to a lot about the sources of that violence in the book is a realization leader driven fear. I think with our current political dialogue there is a separation of what people call Police Violence which we are concerned about or black on black violence and when i wrote between a the world and meet in with a previous book i had no fear to talk about the of violence that was around me that was considered to be black of black that is part of the oppression of people looking at African Americans in the neighborhood there is a way with our mannerisms the way we walk in and talk in bases is rage in the need to express power in that is probably will vice off also the by the time i was older incumbents get the young boys at about the age i was to see Something Else and i saw fear. And that violence to be a product of that figure that was really important to say to alter the narrative of rage which in itself of black people being angry is thatshadows of the whites that when you do that you begin to have humanity to be vulnerable lot being scared and though we are afraid and that is important to say spirit is very powerful that when youre shepherded into the movies the heros struck q does ridiculous digit put keying in the list at the time . Now he is supremely su heroic and to have access to that kind of morality in a lot of that is because itll have a reading in the church so for instance a lot of that is in the afterlife that they dont share and it is rooted in the notion of a supreme god of justice and of which i dont share. But in spite of that you cannot walk into the campaign to see dr. King and not be moved. You cannot watch the laste died speech he gave he is so sick literally falling away from the microphone and not be moved carefully. These are people today in and day out is all you have for a world there would not necessarily see but where the border country is celebratory i feel in danger because it never should have had to happen. A statement of values, so if i were out there you know i seriously would not urge anybody to take issue to any sort of or to do any site sort of violence. On a moral issue i dont think it would be justified. I think the potential for the loss of life can ever be corrupt and the wider what the system does you have a moral responsibility to do to deal with that. The same time when i hear people who have power, who have some amount of stake in the kind of violence that has regularly characterize baltimore from the time i was a child and before that, standup stand up in front of podiums and dismiss people or whatever again it bothers me. It greatly bothers me. You know, besides that we are still in it though. I will have more developed notions once we are out of it that we are still in it. This is probably a question about your method as a writer. I would love to hear you talk a little bit if you would about how you came to write this book. You said to an interviewer over the summer that one of the wonder of things in this book if you have a ready yet is its partly the story of your becoming conscious as you put it in stages growing up and then howard and after that despite all of your reading and everything. All of your thinking and reporting use that as of 20 set set 2,072,008 you would not have written this book and you were radicalized in the years after that so what is it that happened that brought it about . You know i was fortunate to be hired by james bennett. That is lower i was trying to get at. [laughter] this is actually true. I was not fishing for that answer. When i was hired i began writing for a magazine i think had, that was interested in ideas and big notions and putting a footprint on things and that allowed me to stand how i thought about this. The second thing is my primary job was to fill a blog space with thoughts and notions and i took that as an excuse to go back and study and. Something sent to write about what i was reading. People would comment. They would. The stuff i was ready writing and they would comment on it and they said you should. This and you should check out that pit have always been interested in history but the past seven years has been particularly intense for me for the amount of reading i did and africanamericans who are in public and are somehow affiliated with politics carry this burden of having to be uplifted, having to Say Something positive to the youth, to the most then possible way of that definition by the way. Historians have no such burden. That is not how the story is our judge. They write their work and assess assess sad as it is most people dont. Their work anyway. But that frees them. You know i always say this but people say my work is hopeless and my work is pessimistic but you should go and spend some time in the history department. [laughter] when i was signing those books i had an audio book with me and im still not finished and im only a few chapters out. Its a history of the 14th century in europe. We arent talking about the black death or the 100 years war the schism in the church. You think whats happening on the streets of baltimore, we are talking about people taking petty offense and challenging folks to joust duels with battle axes. They literally would have gang fights. You get 50 of your biggest boys and i get 50 of my boys and we are going to mete out here and do this. To call the champions. But its really the same thing. Its no different than youth stepped on my sneaker and you said this to my girl. Its the same kind of language. This is not uplifting material. But its deeply enlightening material. You feel like you know more about the world. That in enough itself is a beautiful thing because for me and again maybe its the absence of religion, i am accepted and i have accepted that. My life is precious and all life can be snuffed out at any moment and that will be at. And the time that i have here, i just want to understand as much as i can. So to understand to me in and of itself, i had this great period at the atlantic where i spend a lot of time trying to understand things. And when it came time for me to write it put me in a difficult position. Again having this prominence you are expected to say certain things that the people in the back of my head talked very differently about the world predates hot area differently about the faith. You know i make statements sometimes like i will say i have some doubts so i will not be surprised if White Supremacy was with this country for the entirety of the lifespan. Oh my god horrors, how can you say that . Listen go poll 100 historians who studied race and White Supremacy and asked them if they would be surprised by that. I was living in france right now and france has been dogged by antisemitism for thousands of years or Something Like that. Is this taking too long . Oh those are the questions, im sorry. [laughter] get on with it. But im just saying that period. That period i mean i think it just changes your angle. I dont even know that radicalized is right. Do you think we can i mean talking about the way you work because it is i think better than any writer i know. You do this unbelievable job of connecting whats happening today to what has happened over long period of time traveling backandforth constantly between narratives and what we see around us is what you see around us and it a link to this recent past in the deep past. From your study of history you say there are lots of reasons. A lot of it is hopeless but do you see areas where we have managed to escape or recover . Yes i mean i think obviously 50 years ago we did not have an africanamerican president. What that means is we are prepared to have a society where individual africanamericans with some mix of hard work talent and a lot of luck achieve great things. I think we are okay with that right now. That is our progress. We obviously dont have enslavement anymore. That is gone but i mean this goes back to your earlier question. When you think about how do we get there, i see people being killed. So it is like even whatever your progress the shadow of that is great violence. And what does that mean about our faith and what does that mean about society in general . What does that mean about human societies period . I dont know. Thank you for these audience questions. The first one is a good one i think. Do you think between the world than me has had a bigger impact on the world or on your son . Do you wish it were the other way around . [laughter] it didnt have much of an impact on my son. I mean you know its not like the book is written as a letter to him but nothing is actually new to him. Everything in here is pretty much stuff that i have said to him already so it has had no impact on him. And he has. The book several times. Okay, daddy right. What about that comic look though . [laughter] [applause] i cant judge what impact it has had on the world. You did a little bit of this at the top cop but do you have any vice for students and young people who want to do what you do . Yes, yes. And write. And write rensin repeat. That is the job. Just go out into the world and live. I think you probably shouldnt think too much about getting published. If you get published and thats great. Its a lot easier now. Think a lot about Getting Better avoid any trappings of glamour. Avoid any ambition towards glamour. Get adjusted to the loneliness and the misery and the horribleness of sitting by yourself and facing a blank page if you can adjust yourself to that there are all sorts of beautiful things that will come out of it a long time after. [laughter] they will come. They will come but i think you really have to adjust yourself to this sort of almost spartan existence of being a writer. I think im probably not the best friend i could be. Largely because of where my commitments are and youll find yourself having to sacrifice that i think. Dont drink too much. I mean this is real. Its not moral advice. This is because writing is a thing that has to get done and if you are out until 2 00 in the morning and not adding up until 2 00 in the afternoon you have lost time for practicing your craft. Dont deal drugs. Avoid drugs probably. Probably, again its not a moral argument but the space of your mind is very important when you are writer. If you want to do a bunch of drugs and drink, go do Something Else and thats fine but if you are going to be a writer your mind in your clarity in your vision is so important. For me, i actually found and again this sounds overly moral but i actually found monogamy as a child at a very young age to be crucial. It rooted me and disciplined me and put me in a place. I could not go out and do some the things people my age my son was born when i was 24 through that couldnt go out and
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