Booknotes: Life Stories: Notable Biographers on the People Who Shaped America

by Brian Lamb

Conversations with the most admired biographers of our time on the people who have forged our contemporary landscape

C-SPAN founder Brian Lamb invites readers into a virtual conversation -- via the art of biography -- with the legends and luminaries who have helped define America. This informal dictionary of biography peers into the personalities who have left a mark on our world -- a Who's Who of American history, and the next best thing to chatting directly with the likes of Abraham Lincoln, Walt Whitman, Susan B. Anthony, Eleanor Roosevelt, J. Edgar Hoover, Elijah Muhammad, Amelia Earhart, Katharine Graham, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., Frank McCourt, Bill Clinton, and many others.

Based on C-SPAN's popular weekly Booknotes program, this absorbing collection of life stories presents illuminating profiles and often surprising details from our favorite biographers. Booknotes follows the evolution of American history chronologically, and covers the lives of writers and thinkers, inventors and scientists, politicians and soldiers. Lamb reacquaints us with the great figures of our times, in an engaging conversation about America.

Genres: Biography, History, Nonfiction, Essays, American History, Politics

496 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Brian Lamb, founder of C-SPAN, currently serves as the C-SPAN Networks' Executive Chairman. Since C-SPAN's founding in 1979, Brian has been a regular on-camera presence, interviewing all presidents since Reagan and many world leaders, members of Congress, journalists and authors. Over 15 years beginning in 1989, Brian interviewed 801 nonfiction authors for a weekly series called "Booknotes." Currently, Brian hosts "Q & A," a Sunday evening, hour-long interview program with people who are making things happen in the public sphere.

Six books of collected Brian Lamb interviews have been published by PublicAffairs based on the "Booknotes" and "Q & A" series, most recently, "Sundays at Eight." And in 2010, PublicAffairs published "The Supreme Court," a collection of interviews Brian and C-SPAN colleague Susan Swain conducted with eleven current and former Supreme Court justices. C-SPAN's 10th book with PublicAffairs, "The Presidents: Noted Historians Rank America's Best - and Worst - Chief Executives," was published in spring 2019.

Brian's work with C-SPAN has been recognized with the Presidential Medal of Honor and the National Humanities Medal. In 2011, Purdue University, Brian's alma mater, announced the naming of the Brian Lamb School of Communication.

Brian is a longtime resident of Arlington, Virginia. When he's not devouring newspapers, websites, nonfiction books, or Thai food at his favorite local restaurant, Brian is likely in hot pursuit of the latest country music release.

Reviews

[Jeanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Described as "biography lite." This is a collection of snippets about famous people, each only a few pages long. They are compliled from NPR interviews of authors of biographies. I have completed about a dozen, and gleaned some interesting trivia. It is great bathroom reading... Example of an interesting thing learned: Margaret Thatcher took home leftovers from State dinners to feed to her family.

[Tammy]

920.02 Boo