Have you come over this is booktv on cspan2, television for serious readers. Heres our prime time lineup. Tonight at 6 45 p. M. Eastern, chris paps reports on the only state capital to file for bankruptcy. Then at 7 45, pulitzer prizewinning science and Technology Reporter john markoff examines the future of robot technology. And at 9 p. M. On after words, minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar discusses her life and political career. Then at 10 eastern, juliana bar bass saw with the Associated Press takes a look at the costs of rio deya near rows 2016 olympics. And at 11, the first women on the supreme court. That all happens tonight on cspan2s booktv. Next, a program from busboys and poets in washington d. C. Jessica jackley, cofounder of the online microlender keva, talks about the impact entrepreneurs in the poorest countries and the impacts they have on their communities. Im happy to be able to host Jessica Jackley as we celebrate the publication of clay, water, brick. In this lovely and inspiring book, jessica draws not just on her experience founding kiva, but also the stories of those entrepreneurs that kiva helps. Jessica holds an mba from stanford, and her words can be seen among many interviews in press. I dont want to say much so, ladies and gentlemen, please help me welcome jessica jack isly to busboys and poets. [applause] [inaudible conversations] good evening, everyone. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you so much for that very kind introduction. Im really happy to be here. As you can tell, i have an amazing support team, which includes three tiny people under the age of 3. It is a wonder that this book ever got written in the last few years. [laughter] but i told them id tell them thank you to cyrus and jasper do you want to wave . Do you want to wave . And asa, whos too little to wave, and my mom and so many of you who are my friends and my be distant family. Thank you for coming tonight. So i was told that over the next 30 or so minutes that i should do a reading and speak for about 25 of those. Id like to make that a little more brief so that we can have a little bit more of a conversation if theres an interest there, and we can have some questions. But i would like to tell you, and im going to go light on the reading tonight, heavy on just the storytelling. I would like to tell you about the entrepreneurs that bookend what ive written here. One is named patrick and one is named fatuma, and patrick is the entrepreneur for who this book is named, actually. Clay, water, brick points to a story of patrick, this entrepreneur that i met in uganda several years ago, about a decade ago. And he told me his story as follows. He explained how years earlier he had fled the Northern Area of the country because a rebel group had attacked his village, taken most of his family can ill be careful with my language because of the little ones and he had basically fled with almost nothing except his brother. And he settled in a village on the boarder of kenya and uganda with this brother, unschooled, orphaned, hungry, homeless. He didnt have much of anything. He had some distant cousins that he found there, and they wanted to be close to family, any family at all, so thats where they settled. Patrick had to figure out what to do to support him and his brother. Sadly, this kind of situation isnt all that rare around the world, to have to wake up every day and figure out how youre going to feed yourself and your loved ones. And patrick told me how a few years before i had been there speaking with him back in 2004. He had decided one day as he woke up watching the sunrise, leaning his back against this mud structure where he and his brother slept, he had sort of a moment, one of these wonderful epiphanies, these little bolts of inspiration, because as he sort of rested his hand next to him on the earth, he looked down and realized that there was opportunity right in the ground beneath where he was sitting. And he started to dig, first just with his hands, and then with a stick and a metal implement that he found nearby, and he realized as he dug, he learned and he realized that some of the dirt actually was a little bit more clay. There was some clay deposits, and if he mixed that with water, it could be shaped. He decided to shape some of this earth into bricks, and he did that. The first bricks were rough and misshapen and crumbled easily, but he kept at it, he refined what he was doing, and eventually he was able to make bricks he was able to sell. It was enough to be something. And he did that again and again, day after day, and got better and better at that. He saved his money, and over the time he was able to buy a brick mold. Often when i tell patricks story, i can show a picture of the mold thats very similar to the one he got. Imagine, like, a rectangle with a line down the middle. So he instantly doubled his production because he could make two bricks at a time, these basic mud bricks, but they were smoother and more consistently shaped and size, and, of course, these sold for a little bit more. So he did that, saved up. Soon he was able to afford a bicycle taxi into a nearby village so he could apprentice just for a few days with a brick maker there who baked his bricks in a selfcontained kiln. Patrick let his bricks dry in the sun. It was free, it was easy, but the bricks didnt end up as strong as they could have been had he been baking them in a kiln. Saved more money, bought some matches, started baking his bricks, they sold for a little bit more. By the time i met patrick, not only had he taken other steps like replacing a lot of his homemade implements, but he employed his brother, several other of his neighbors, and he had a thriving business x. He showed me how the old mud hut where he was sitting when he had his moment of inspiration had been replaced by a new home with baked mud bricks that he had pulled from the earth with his own two hands. So if thats not an entrepreneur, im not sure what is. The thing is, patricks story is special, and it is unique, but it is not rare. There are entrepreneurs like this all over the world. And enf i general winly believe theyre entrepreneurs. I think some people would warn not to conflate a person like patrick with a real entrepreneur. Thats how they would want to talk about it. And i think people like patrick, all the noise falls away, and you get to see really clearly what the entrepreneurial spirit is all about. Now, the person at the end of the book is more of a sobering warning and a contrast to patrick. Her name is fatuma. When i met her, i was shocked. I actually met her about 200 i think thats right, oh, 800 miles due southish of where patrick she lived outside of tanzania, and when i met fatuma and asked her how her business was going and what she was doing and by the way, i should back up. I was there ten years ago with a nonprofit called village enterprise, and village enterprise provided 100 grants to entrepreneurs to start or grow their businesses. These were two of the recipients of that funding. I was there to do an impact survey, try to understand what kind of benefits it had provided to the individuals, if any. So they had this wonderful excuse to spend my days interviewing entrepreneurs like patrick and fatuma and so many others. Again, i had an excuse to ask them questions about their life and what was going on with their wellness, their standard of living. So fatuma showed me, very proudly, some written records that she had kept in blue books. Do you remember those blue books . I wrote all my middle School Essays in those. Somehow she had these, and she had kept little notes about her business, quite detailed records, actually. And as i looked over them, i thought, wait a minute, this is a real ragstoriches sort of story. So i looked through other records, and i questioned and, indeed, those numbers were accurate. She explained to me how her charcoal business had been thriving over the last few years and how everything had, indeed, started to change because of this 100 that she had been given. The thing was as i looked around fatumas home which, again, was a mud structure, very meager, not much inside of it at all except twofolding chairs where we were sitting, a small table and a mattress in the corner, i was very confused because anybody who had had that kind of drastic increase in profits in their business could have a much more sustainable livelihood, i would have thought at that point in time after id seen a number of other businesses that their life would look a lot different. She was dressed in tattered clothing, she had lost some teeth, she was very gaunt. She had told me outright that she wasnt eating very well and sickness was frequent, a frequent occurrence in her family. And so is i asked her, fatuma, where are the profits from your business . What have you done . Your business is doing really well. Do you not, you know why have you not invested in the basic things, better food, a mosquito net, school for your daughters, things like that that i had heard again and again were priorities for individuals that i met. She was a character. Well, she kind of smiled and looked around like other people were listening in. And she went, she said went over to the other side of her mud home and patted the ground next to the mattress where she slept, and she said its all here in the world bank, and cracked up. She thought it was so funny. She had literally buried the money in the earthen floor. I thought it was a great joke, actually, the world bank. Thats where she had stopped, her journey had stopped. So theres a lot more to tell about both of those stories and about so many other entrepreneurs. The thing is for years i asked the question to myself whats the difference, what makes patrick different than fatuma . Is are they both entrepreneurs . Do they both have that spirit that i so admire and long to nurture in myself and other people . The thing is i think, you know, the entrepreneurial spirit is not just about executing on a set of steps to build a great business. I think its about something more. I think its about constantly seeing opportunities, new opportunities. Not just out there in the world, just, you know, to create a great business, but in ourselves. And to want more for ourselves and others around us. I think fatuma at some point along the way, she got quite far, but she stopped dreaming, and she stopped seeing the ways that the real world could be better. Now, look, i would never want to create some sort of, you know, consumercrazy sort of person in fatuma. I wouldnt want her to suddenly have desires and want more than she could have in her life. I thought there could be so much more for her, and i saw her stop short. She stopped imagining a different future for herself. So as ive thought about entrepreneurship over the last decade, ive sort of come to this place. I told you the first entrepreneur and the last entrepreneur that i happen to have in here, and throughout i talk about my own journey. And what i think ive come down so is i love an existing definition of entrepreneurship from howard stevenson, a Harvard Business school professor. And as a stanford graduate, i try not to quote harvard professor, but whatever. [laughter] just kidding. He saws that says that entrepreneurship is about the pursuit of opportunities without regard to movement forward, taking steps every day. Its about action, not what we have, not what we possess. Its about moving forward despite level of education or pedigree or research thats on hand, right . The cash that you have, you know, stashed awaysome, maybe buried in the earth. Its about deciding to always look for ways to make things better in the world and to add value. Now, i did want to and so i thought about that, ive written, hopefully, well about that and in a way that could inspire anybody whether or not they see themselves as a entrepreneur to think differently about how they work and how they live, to constantly be looking for entrepreneurial opportunities and to be able to seize them and take steps forward and to be confident that they can do so regardless of the excuses and the ways that we can feel stuck every day. I hope this can be a book that gets people unstuck. And the part that i thought i wanted to read tonight because a handful of folks i know here from development work. Development work is a whole other book probably someday, but its full of really awkward moments. And i thought the entrepreneurial stories ive told you are representative of others that are in here, but heres just one other piece that i think is just something ive had to come to terms with and to reconcile as a white, middle class girl woman from, you know, pennsylvania. Ive gotten a lot of questions over the years about why did i go to afterda, and why havent africa, and why havent i done things here in the United States . I could talk about that too. But ill read you this little piece and then tell you one more thing about kiva, so this is a section right at the end calls cutout. A few years ago i flew to miami for a conference. As i entered the Four Seasons Hotel where the gathering was held, a blast of airconditioning instantly made my teeth chatter. I clenched my jaw and tried to force a smile. I followed the shiny, laminated signs with cursive psychologicals and gloved hands, icons, you know, pointing the way to our meeting, and i meanders through the wide hallways. Sound of laughter got louder as i pulled my carryon luggage behind me. I chuckled to myself. Inside the luggage were clothes for miami weather, but now i wished i had brought gloves, a jacket and a scarf knowing i had to spend the next few days sitting inside one of these frigid, windowless conference rooms. I turned the corner and saw my group. Men in pastelcolored polo shirts mingled with women in skirts and sun dresses. Most were gently tanned or pinkskinned from long days of golf or tennis or an afternoon sitting by the pool. Nearly all held ice cold cocktails or glasses of wine in their hands. These were familiar faces to me, some staff of the organization, and some other High Net Worth individuals that supported the work. All were crucial contributors, and as i scanned the room, i realized those present were probably responsible for funding the majority of the years operating expenses. I was the anomaly, younger and less experienced, quite uncomfortable and used to unused to chic hotel ballrooms. In addition to the goal of bringing people together, these gatherings were crafted to tell a story to attendees, one of need and opportunity that would culminate in a series of invitations to the people of this room to become the heroes of the story by giving generously. No one had seen me yet. Despite my individuals of the love, i was tired, cold and thirsty, so i made a beeline for the open bar. I turned to face the group looking at the crowd of friendly faces. What caught my eye was an unfamiliar darkskinned face that stared at me unblinking. In fact, as i looked, there were several faces all stationed evenly around that ballroom. All of them seemed turned in my direction with fixed smiles that seem to remain in place. I blinked not completely sure what i was seeing. I stood on tiptoe and craned my neck so i could get a better look at one of the strangers. As i did, his face suddenly reflected a flash of light from the photographers camera, and i understood. I sighed and gulped my wine. Along the perimeter of the room were lifesized cutouts of entrepreneurs, each one representing a different country served by the institution and each representing a different kind of business activity. [laughter] some of the cardboard people stood among props and equipment. In one corner was a cutout of an older woman smiling holding chickens and on a rustic looking table next to her, someone had placed a brown basket with a carton of plastic eggs alongside a rooster. A cutout of a younger, darkskinned woman with a secondhand tshirt held some grain in her hands and stood among several potted plants. On the ground were heavy sacks of rice from a local grocery store. A cutout of another woman stood behind some wooden crates fills with fakepainted foam fruits and vegetables. A man from Central America leaned against one of the walls near the half dozen light switches for the chandeliers above. Mercifully, he had no props. I turned my gaze away and walked into the crowd to talk to the living, breathing, reallive pastelclad people around me, all of whom were there to serve the kinds of entrepreneurs whose lifesized images encircled us. It had been a long time since i had learned about poverty 20 some years earlier. Sadly, some of the stories of the thinking that motivates those stories hasnt changed much. I tried to filter the good from the bad, the factual from the manipulative, the realistic from the overly dramatic, but still once in a while these stories get to me. Like when im surrounded by cardboard cutout toes that are supposed to make me feel closer to real people when, in fact, they were doing the opposite. And i feel pangs of the confusion and the anxiety that i did back then when i was a little kid who was told that poverty could never be fixed, that the poor would always be with us. Once in a while i do still feel overwhelmed, and there are still moments when the magnitude of the problem plaguing so many People Living on this planet feels crushing. But i have learned how to fight back. I now know never to turn away from the issues that scare me. Ive learned not to conflate difficult issues with the people they affect. Ive learned to ask hard questions and to get answers for myself firsthand, and i know it is always worth getting closer to the people that i want to understand so i can hear their truths from them directly. Know not to wait for permission to do the things im passionate about. While my efforts are never perfect, ive learned it is always worth it to keep trying, and most importantly, ive become absolutely convinced that real positive change is possible. Ive become sorry, poverty does not have to win in the end, and anyone who wants to participate in making the world better can. Even the most unqualified individuals can contribute great things, even the most humble efforts can end up improving the lives of thousands or millions of people. I know that without a doubt this is true. Despite everything, we can still serve each other in ways that have a permanent, lasting effect. The stories that i heard, like patricks, inspired me and my cofounder, matt, to create kiva, and ten years ago when we decided to do this, the motivation really was to tell a different story about poverty and to focus instead of the sadness and suffering instead of on the strength and empowerment and selfrealization that these individuals were striving for. And additionally, not just to tell that new story is, but to provide a different way for people to respond. Not just throw their change in the jar, be thanked and go on with the rest of their lives, but to truly be engaged after time as that individuals story unfolded and to be an equal partner perhaps through a loan. So at kiva