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Todd Purdum spoke about his book, An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, at Politics & Prose on Friday, April 4, 2014. In a powerful narrative layered with revealing detail, Todd S. Purdum tells the story of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, recreating the legislative maneuvering and the larger-than-life characters who made its passage possible. From the Kennedy brothers to Lyndon Johnson, from Martin Luther King Jr. to Hubert Humphrey and Everett Dirksen, Purdum shows how these all-too-human figures managed, in just over a year, to create a bill that prompted the longest filibuster in the history of the U.S. Senate yet was ultimately adopted with overwhelming bipartisan support. He evokes the high purpose and low dealings that marked the creation of this monumental law, drawing on extensive archival research and dozens of new interviews that bring to life this signal achievement in American history. |
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Mark Harris spoke about his book, Five Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World War, at Politics & Prose on Wednesday, March 26, 2014. Harris, longtime Entertainment Weekly writer and editor and author of Pictures at a Revolution, focuses on five major filmmakers to analyze the role Hollywood played in World War II, and vice-versa. When the U.S. entered the war, John Ford, Frank Capra, William Wyler, John Huston, and George Stevens joined the military, filming battles, liberations, and invasions. Harris chronicles their achievements and the struggles with bureaucracy, ideology, and budgets. |
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Betty Medsger spoke about her book, The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI, at Politics & Prose on Sunday, March 14, 2014. March 8, 1971 is famous for the Ali-Frazier bout, but this was also, not accidentally, when the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI broke into the Bureau’s office in Media, Pennsylvania. Looking for evidence that Hoover was spying on Americans he considered subversive, the burglars made off with reams of incriminating evidence. Medsger, then with The Washington Post, was among the journalists who received copies of the documents. Now, having interviewed seven of the eight participants, she tells in detail the story of this courageous act of civil disobedience. |
