of the republic from 1789. george washington s mount vernon hosted this event. ms. dunn: i am the chief of staff at george washington s mount vernon. you are in for a wonderful presentation. i would like to take a moment to thank ford motor company for supporting george washington s mount vernon and continuing to fun this opportunity. i would also like to recognize some special guests. we have our george washington leadership fellows here, 16 fivents spending weeks immersed into a leadership program. they are here through the generosity of david rubenstein, who helped us conceive of the idea to have this group of students here. i would like you to stand so that we can recognize you. [applause] ms. dunn: this is our second class of fellows. they just arrived this week and have very busy schedules, but they are wonderful to speak with. it is now my honor to be able to injures tonight s introduce tonight speaker, fergus bordewich. he has been a independent historian and writer
how he was feeling worn out and tired, freight his memory was going. jefferson would say tell me more. their relationship has been studied quite a bit. there has been a lot written about it. but it was clearly a nuanced relationship. the men respect each other. we tended to focus on the points of division. i saw flaws in china. when he feels jefferson was made a promise when he feels he broke the promise washington takes a personal. his own diary which is interesting. a big round. the conversation that came out. good research to be done. i great storehouse. hindered younger graduate students. now, like washington and get paid for doing this tonight. yeah. so, that means you can help out. do that in an orderly fashion. don t even have to read it. when i tune in on the weekend s authors sharing and knew releases. the best television for serious readers. they can have a longer conversation delve in. author after author after author. now, the return of george wa
you re watching booktv on c-span2 with top non-fiction books and authors every weekend. booktv television for serious readers. from my father i inherited my confidence my resilience, my passion, and my audacity, looking back although it was never explained to me in this way, he taught me the spirit of which is greek idea of honor and doing the right thing, even when one s own interests or even one s own life is in peril. growing up while i never fought anything but australian there were two stories about the second world war and greece that i always kept close to my heart. the first was in 1940 when benito mussolini italy s prime minister asked the greek prime minister for free passage through greece and on the spot at 3:00 in the morning without hesitation, without consultation he said oy he said no. it was spirited defiance and quite incredible when considering just how vastly outnumbered the greeks were by the italians. it prompted sir winston churchhill, the greatest
in camp the encampment so i was at the encampment, you walk a ground and learn more about it but you understand the writing and i try to have that reflected in my work. in that sense i view myself as a historian. i don t write historical fiction but i am inspired by historical fiction and love to read historical fiction. and james mcpherson catches it in the battle cry of freedom. is a wonderful book. ft can t trust everything in it as fact but it does give you the sense of the place. .. i try to use a lot of quotations because i try to make which makes differentiating to me from some historians, but i try to have an eye for the quote that really captures something. i never use a long block and [inaudible] quote. when i read, i always skip those. i figure if the author can t summarize it why is he forcing me to do it? so i use small quotes, ones that are below 50 words so you don t have to block in denim. then i figure that s my job as a historian, to pull out the quirk
this event, i wish to thank my only possible criticism is that they scheduled me right up against mr. gwyn next door. i used to teach civil war history. lots of books come out on the civil war but not many of them are as good as his book rebel yell. of all of possible people to be scheduled up against i find that a little daunting coin. thank you for being here. is event must be full. second i thank my host j. ford was my host last night, took me to a wonderful dinner, the only possible qualm i have with that is took me after the author s reception, it was very late and was the pink house. they brought me a piece of fish that is bigger than a plate, the tailstock out on one end and there was so much food that i am stuff and i figure i have to speak. the only wise than i did was liquor too. i turned down the wine and liquor and dime stuff from that food. i was not so lucky at lunch. i had a wonderful pleasure of you probably know him. a wonderful daughter and couldn t restra