c-span2, 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books every weekend. [inaudible conversations] >> each year we bring you several events across the country. here's a look at upcoming affairs and festivals we plan on covering this year. ..

>> and we'll add them to our list. email us at booktv@c-span.org. >> next on booktv, sally bedell smith recounts of life of queen elizabeth ii who assented the british throne in 1952 at the age of 25. it's about 45 minutes. >> before we get started let me tell you because we're going to have a long signing line this evening but if you want a book signed but you don't want to stand in line, purchase the book, leave it at the information counter with the instructions of how you would like it signed and then you can pick it up anytime after tomorrow morning. we'll get it signed for you.

i'm barbara meade i'm of the founders of politics and prose and this evening i want to welcome sally bedell smith. i introduced her several times before. and this evening she's here to talk about her biography of elizabeth who is in her 60th year as queen. her diamond anniversary it is. and chronicling the lives of william paley, pamela harriman, diana, both the kennedys and both the clintons, i think sally has well established herself as a prominent biographer, prominent and bestselling biographer, i should say. for the past 15 years she has also been a contributing editor to vogue and before that she wrote for "time" and she was the cultural reporter for the "new

york times." during the time -- this is a personal aside, that she was researching this biography, she poach well, she was interviewing over 200 people and spending six months in residence in london, her daughter was married. this was a true anglo-american event. her daughter married an english army officer at the guards chapel, which is just -- what she says was a stone throw's for buckingham palace. the part -- i was just telling sally, the part of elizabeth's life that i was so impressed with, was her complete dedication that she was a fell informed monarch. she was regularly briefed by the prime minister and she assiduously went through her diplomatic red leather box that came to her every day that had

intelligence reports, budget reports, minutes of various sessions of parliament. she was just -- she was very studious in doing that. well, there's no recognized prophysician or school that you can go to become a queen so she came at it with no training at all but she came to a position where she was monarch, wife and mother but most of all, i think, in a royal family that had been so marked by scandal -- actually, it was scandal that put her -- one scandal, it was the one that put her onto the throne and that was marriage of edward the viii to the twice-divorced wallace simpson

and he abdicated and that placed her directly in line to succeed to the throne. she -- and then on top of that, she's had three divorces in her family. three of her children now have been divorced. she's had the lives of her two daughters-in-law, diana and camilla parker-bowles been in the gossip columns over and over again. and it's been something that she's so successfully created her distance from and she has by all reports and i think you'll feel this when you finish the book is a well well respected queen but as sally will tell us about, she's also been able to preserve a very good sense of humor and have a great -- what

sally describes as joie de vivre so here's sally to tell us about it. [applause] >> thank you very much, barbara. i was so tickled to see you here tonight because i so enjoyed being introduced by you before. you're always so thoughtful in your introductions and thank you very, very much. several years ago, when the queen was at one of her yearly garden parties at buckingham palace making her way through a crowd of nearly 9,000 people and greeting a selection of guests, she was asking such standard questions as, have you come far? when one woman at her and said, what do you do? [laughter] >> several days later at a friend's birthday party, the queen described the exchange and confessed, i had no idea what to say. it was the first time in all the

years of meeting people that anybody ever asked her that question. well, my job in writing "elizabeth the queen" is not only explain what she does but to tell what she's really like. and to take the reader as close as possible to elizabeth the human being, the wife, the mother, and the friends as well as the highly respected leader. today i'm going to talk first about what it was like to write about queen elizabeth. and second, i'd like to share with you some of the many surprising discoveries that i made about the queen because she is the best known woman in the world, people feel as if they know her, but the real woman is very different from the woman in vet velvet and irman. this is my sixth biography, all of them about larger than life characters that barbara mentioned but there is no one like the queen and she lives in

her very own remarkable world. while other heads of state have come and gone, elizabeth is the longest-serving leader in the world, spanning the 20th and 21st centuries. she is the 40th monarch in the thousand-year history of the british monarchy, reigning over the united kingdom, england, wales, scotland and northern ireland, along with 15 realms and 14 overseas territories. she is the second monarch to celebrate a diamond jubilee marking 60 years on the throne which she will meet on february 6th. the only other was her great, great grandmother queen victoria whose celebration was 115 years ago when she was 78 years old.

when elizabeth who soon 86 who is still on the throne on september 13th she will sur pause victoria's rain of nearly 64 years. between the two of them, victoria and elizabeth have been on the throne for 124 of the last 174 years. and have symbolized britain far longer than the four men who were kings between their reigns. elizabeth is always surrounded by people. but being queen makes her a solitary and singular figure. it is crucial for her to keep a delicate balance at all times. if she seems too mysterious and distant she loses her bond we are subjects. but if she seems too much like everyone else, she loses her mystique. she doesn't carry a passport. she doesn't have a driver's license, although, one of her cousins told me that she drives like a bat out of hell on the

roads of her country estate. [laughter] >> she can't vote. she can't appear as a witness in court and she can't change her faith from anglican to catholic. her closest friends and family bows and curtsies when she greet her. although she was raised by strict nannies who prevent her from being spoiled but she was trained about this deference. i was told one time when then queen elizabeth came to visit his scotland and he playfully threw her on the cushion, her father bunched him in the stomach and said don't you ever do that to royalty. the princess didn't mind, my

friend told me, but that was the structure in which she was brought up. so how is a biographer particularly an american penetrate the royal bubble especially when the queen has had a policy for the past 60 years of not granting interviews? actually, it really wasn't too different from the way i approached my other books, which was to turn to those who knew her best for insights and information. i am a long time aglifile and i have britain the past three decades and have made a lot of friends, some of whom helped me when i was reporting my book on princess diana in the late 1990s. when i started researching the queen's life, i went back to a group of key sources who agreed to help me again and to introduce me to more people who knew the royal family. they also served as my advocates

in getting cooperation from buckingham palace. my book on diana had been fair to the royal family and particularly to charles, so the senior staff at the palace briefed the queen and they gave me the green light. as a result, i had access to her inner circle of close friends and advisors. while the queen has disciplined herself to keep her views and emotions under wraps in public, those close to her shared with me some of her fascinating opinions and feelings, what worried her most about prince charles when his marriage to diana was falling apart, for example. what would happen if she became physically or mentally incapacitated? and even some politically sensitive opinions including one hot button issue that she discussed with an american ambassador. her friends explained the secrets of her serenity and her courage and they sized her up

sometimes in unusually perceptive ways. monty roberts, the california horse whisperer, who is one of her most unlikely friends, told me that when the queen gave him good advice, she showed an incredible ability to read intention just like a horse does. with the assistance of the palace i was also able to watch the queen and prince philip in many different settings, at the garber parade at the win senior castle, at buckingham palace and one of her annual garden parties at the palace, for that i received a personalized invitation on white paste board embossed in gold with the queen's crown and sieffer announcing that the lord chamberlain had been commanded by her majesty to invite me.

everybody got that. watching the queen at that garden party make her along a line of people, i was struck by her measured pace, for lord chamberlain who is the lead official at buckingham palace, he told me she moves slowly to absorb everything that's going on and to take at what's going on and i marvelled on her brief but focused conversations and her sturdy stance, a technique that she once explained to the wife of one of her foreign secretaries by lifting her evening gown above her ankle and saying, one plants one steep apart like this. always keep them parallel, make sure your weight is evenly distributed and that's all there is to it. as i observed the queen over the course of the year, i accumulated impressions that

helped me understand how she carries out her ro the queen replied, if i miss once, i might never catch up again. mary sones, who is the youngestster of the queen's first prime minister, winston

churchill told me when elizabeth was a young 25-year-old queen, her father had been impressed by her attentiveness that she always paid attention to whatever she was doing. it's hard to imagine that the amount of information that the queen has accumulated in six decades and she has used it to exercise it on her right to be consulted and encouraged and to be warned when she meet with government officials as well as senior officials and judges who come to her for confidential private audiences. as she once said, the fact that there's nobody else there, gives them a feeling that they can say what they like. the most important encounters have been the weekly audiences with her 12 prime ministers. consider the trajectory, from churchill who was born in the

19th century and saved in the army of her great, great great grandmother, queen victoria, to david cameron, her current prime minister who was born three years after her youngest child, prince edward. she actually glimpsed for the first time her future twelfth prime minister when he appeared at age 8 in a school production of toad of toad hall with edward. probably her most fascinating fascinating relationship was with margaret thatcher and in the course of my reporting, i gained some great insights into how that relationship worked and some of which contradicted the common view. the queen does not have executive power but she does have unique influence. in her role as head of state she represents the government at home and abroad but she also serves serves as head of nation

which means she connects with people to award their achievements and remain in touch with their concerns. two decades passed the normal retirement age she does something like 400 engagements a year. traveling around the united kingdom to cities as well as tiny hamlets. charles pull who served as private secretary to both john major and margaret thatcher told me that the queen knows every inch of this country in a way that no one else does. she spends so much time meeting people that she has an understanding of what other people's lives are like. she understands what the normal human condition is. she's also spent an extraordinary amount of time honoring citizens and members of the military for exemplary service. in 60 years, she's conferred more than 400,000 honors and awards and given them in person

over 600 times. people needs pats on the back sometimes, she said. it's a very dinghy world otherwise. traveling with the queen was particularly valuable especially the royal tour i took with bermuda and trinidad. she was 83 years old at the time and her program called for long days of meeting and greeting. her stamina was impressive matched only by 88-year-old prince philip. whenever they go on a trip like that, the lord chamberlain always accompanies them to the airport and phillips waves back and says, mind the shop. i got a real sense of how much in sync philip and elizabeth are with an expert choreography sort of like forehead astaire and ginger rogers. i also saw aspects of him that contradict his caricature of brashness and insensitivity.

he always watches the queen intently to see if she needs any assistance. i once saw him bring a little child over to greet her. he often spots people in the crowd who can't see very well and he'll walk them out to give them a better vantage point. when a queen needs a boost, he's also there with a humorous aside such as don't be so sad, sausage. [laughter] >> on the last night in trinidad i also witnessed at close range what i had heard about from several people, that the queen doesn't perspire, even in the hottest temperatures. the british high commissioner was hosting a garden party in his hilltop home on such a steamy evening that everyone, including me, was dripping from the heat. but after an hour of lively conversations with some 65 guests, the queen walked past me very close by and there was absolutely no moisture on her

face. one of her cousins who traveled in the tropics with her explained in her own way that the queen's skin does not run water. [laughter] >> and while it may look good, it does make her uncomfortable. i saw further evidence of this a year later on a july day at ground zero in manhattan when the temperature hit 103 degrees and one of the women the queen spoke to, we were all pouring sweat but she didn't have a beat on her, that must be what it's like to be a royal. during these tricks i was able to see the buckingham palace machinery on the road. to get to see the officials and the queen and the way her household has changed from the early days when it was run entirely by aristocratic men, as i stood in her hotel in

trinidad, her master in the household pointed toward a half dozen foot men, one of whom was navy all dressed in navy blue suits. she said sam over there, she said, he has a master's degree in pailen -- palentology. >> at her stables in barkshire one of her horse trainers took me out on the gallops which is the rolling hills where she loves to spend morning hours in the mist wearing her head scarf, her tweed jacket and her wellington boots as she watches her racehorses work out. at her castle in edinburgh, her top official gave me a tour, i spent the night in the tower at the castle of may which is the queen mother's house in northern

scotland where the queen used to visit every year. i hiked the hills and walked along the river d at the queen's estate in the scottish highlands, at balmoral, i spent a day getting a tour of the stud farm with her stud manager and her head stallion groom. i also spent a day inspecting the royal yacht britannia which is now a museum near edinburgh, and i was lucky enough to attend several dinners in the ballroom and the picture gallery at buckingham palace, i was not alas a guest of the queen's but i was invited by prince charles who was hosting his annual gatherings of his prince of wales foundation. but sitting at a table decorated with george iii silver gilt

candles i could ensconced with royal livery while the queen entertained heads of state but my favorite moments was at windsor which the queen considers her real home. i spent time with two of the queen's elderly first cousins who have known her longer than anybody else. both live near the castle in modest homes that the queen gave to them. and every sunday after church, the queen drives her jaguar to visit one of the cousins, barbara rhodes who greets her with a courtesy and hands her a begin and dubanier and they sit down and they chat about friends and family. as i sat on margaret's sagging sofa in her alarm where her dogs toys were scattered all around the floor, i could imagine the queen sitting in the very same spot with her hat on her head

but completely relaxed. at public events, i watch the queen at a distance. always a smiling icon in the crowd, careful not to engage the crowd too much. so it was especially helpful to have three social encounters at private gatherings and each time i caught the animated gestures, the sparkling blue eyes and the flashing smile familiar to her friends but rare in public. on my first meeting during a garden party at the british ambassador's residence here in washington, i watched the queen have a spirited conversation with my husband about the kentucky derby and i remembered what the british artist howard morgan had told me after painting her portrait. her private side took me completely by surprise, he said. she talks like an italian. she waves her hands about her.

[laughter] >> two years later, after i'd been working on the queen's biography for a year, i met her again at a retion at st. john's palace, which is a group that promotes anglo-american fellow. when i mentioned to her that my daughter was getting married in london, she asked, when is the wedding? the fourth of july, i replied. oh, she said, that's a little dangerous. [laughter] once again, i saw the smile and the twinkle the third time was a month before the wedding of prince william and kate middleton. again we met at st. james palace at a party given by one of the queen's cousins. i knew that the queen would be there but i didn't expect her to stay 90 minutes and she was in high spirits. the atmosphere was much more informal than the pilgrim's reception, probably because so many of her friends and family

members were there and she was making her way happily on her own without any attendants running in her way. and here she was in her own palace but she was merely another guest which was a measure of me to her surprising humility. when i greeted her, i told her that i'd recently been to the home of one of her american friends in florida. i've never been to that house, she said. so i told her about it, and particularly that how much of it had been designed for their grandchildren. yes, she said and they have so many, don't they. clearly, she didn't miss a trick. the first question ask me about the queen is, what was most -- what was the most surprising thing i learned about her which was very difficult to answer because so much was expected. one surprise was that humility

that i just mentioned. part of her side that is seldom seen. behind her regal and dignified image, the queen is also smart, shrewd, tolerant, cozy, sensitive, lively, funny, compassionate, keenly observeant and earthy. here's some traits, how about cozy. when the american was at prince philip, the queen invited him to her private dining room, there was no butlers to serve the meal, not only did the queen insist on serving him from a buff fay but she insisted on clearing the table, she stacked the plates, he said, which we were taught never to do when we were growing up.

[laughter] >> another time she was entertaining a group at a luncheon and she told the men next to her, i need to explain about the napkins as she looked down the table. they have the starched side down to the nap conditions will slide off their knee. do it with the unstarched side on your he and you tuck it under your bottom. what about spontaneous? while driving a scottish cleric on her balmoral estate, she suddenly goes hooray as she passes one of her game keepers with a woman. the queen explained that his wife had left him and she was absolutely delighted that he was out with a new girlfriend. [laughter] >> sensitive, when margaret thatcher had her 80th birthday in 2005, she had become frail

and her minded been impaired by strokes. as the queen approached, the former prime minister extended her hand and the queen held it as margaret thatcher curtsied to her but what was surprising is the queen continued to hold her hand and then tenderly guided her through the crowd of 650 guests which was a remarkal site for the british who are unaccustomed to see the queen to see the queen so physically demonstrative. compassionate, when ira terrorists killed louie mount battan the queen's cousin along with several other members of his family, the queen cared for mountbattan's 14-year-old son who had been severely injured in the attack. when he arrived at balmoral late one evening with his sister, the queen was there to greet them and she served them soup and sandwiches, took them to their rooms and even started to unpack

them until she was prevailed upon to go to bed. timothy later talked about her unstoppable mothering. he told me that the queen had been caring and sensitive and intuitive and that she had managed to get him talking about his traumatic experience in a way that nobody else had been able to do. funny, british actress prunella scales got rave reviews for playing the queen in alan bennett's play "a question of attribution" and when she was introduced to the queen, she bowed and the queen said, i expect you think i should be doing that to you? [laughter] >> earthy, probably the least expected trait when you think of the prim and proper queen imagine her stockings stag in her macintosh trousers controlling on her stomach through the undergrowth with her

nose of the boots in front of her or visiting her yearlings in their stable and seem that they seem to be suffering from respiratory problems. she blew her noise, showed her trainer what was in the handkerchief in here, it's too dusty in her and there's no air and he promptly installed a better ventilation system and the final thing because the image is so sweet. when the queen and prince philip were a guest with ronald and 19 ronald reagan in 1983, reagan's deputy chief of staff asked the queen's private secretary why she was taking so long to prepare for the evening. the queen needs her tearresta time. the private secretary explained that she has a little kit with tools that she uses to decorate certain diamond tiaras by hooking pearls or emeralds or

sapphires or rubies on them depending on what she's wearing. her former crown jewelry david thomas confirmed to me that this past time is something she enjoys a great deal. while such private glimpses may surprise many people, elizabeth's behavior as queen has always been reassuring and consistent and predictable. her wise conduct and her unifying -- her role as a unifying force are more valued today than ever. long admired and respected she is now beloved. when she celebrated her golden jubilee then, people realized she was about stability, continuity, calm through adversity and humor when things are going wrong. her former senior advisor charles anson told me. they got the point of the queen who had been doing her job for 5015 years. now she's reached her 60-year

milestone, she is bigger than politics or celebrity or fashion. yet, she has learned to move with the times, making sure the monarchy is responsive without being trendy. her ability to adapt to a changing world is all the more impressive whether you consider she grew up in an edwardian atmosphere. she is the sheet anchor in the middle for people to manage hang on for people of turbulence her top advisor told me. she lives by the values we have had which made me the top stories foe me to read but and i hope her readers are equally inspired. thank you. [applause] [applause] >> can we go to the mic right here in the middle for questions

please. can you go to the mic? it's right behind you. it's right behind you. >> i can talk loud. >> no, they can't hear you. >> you have to go to the microphone. >> oh? >> there you go. >> what was her relationship with diana? and divorce of charles and the situation with the situation of diana and charles? >> well, that was one of the most difficult periods of her reign, i would say. she was hoping that her son charles would marry happily and i think at the beginning they all thought diana was ideal. they seemed to be -- they seemed to be in love or at least they talked themselves into thinking

being in love but they were, in fact, very badly mismatched. she was very welcoming to diana in the beginning. i think everybody underestimated how sensitive and how kind of emotionally turbulent she was and how difficult it would be for her to adapt to royal life. but one of her -- one of princess diana's close friends said that the queen always kept an open door for her. the problem was that, you know, the queen can be a bit formidable. and diana was very young and she was somewhat intimidated by her and so she didn't take that opportunity to go and spend time with her and get to know her better. and the queen was very busy and she just assumed people would take care of her and bring her along which didn't really happen but a lot of the problems that happened between charles and

diana were quite invisible to both the queen and prince philip and it really wasn't until the book written by andrew morton that diana had secretly had collaborated with, that was published in 1992, which was 11 years after they were married and it was highly grill of charles. it was very damaging to charles. and very tough on the rest of the royal family. so the queen not -- not completely understandably viewed this as a act of betrayal and disloyalty and it was compounded by the fact when she was asked about it, diana did not tell the truth. so at that point it became clear that it was going to be difficult for them to continue with their marriage so they separated not long after that. and then, you know -- >> but the reason she choose her grandson and not her son to

succeed her? >> oh, she hasn't done that. charles is definitely in line to succeed her. oh, yes, that's the way it works. yeah, i think -- there have been public opinion polls that have indicated that a lot of people would prefer to see the, you know, beautiful young couple succeed her, but charles is the one, yeah. >> okay, thank you. >> i think somebody is at the mic right now. >> perhaps i'll read about it in the book, but i wonder if the queen has ever commented to her circle of friends publicly about her speech affliction of her father. has she talked about it? i think to this extent, i think she was so she so admired him for his duty and his absolute

determination to overcome it, i think it must have been very difficult for her to see. she once said that the quality that affected her most about him was his steadfastness, and she learned a lot from watching him and from seeing him overcome what was, you know, almost a crippling disability and yet go on and be an incredibly admirable queen, particularly during world war ii. i think that's when she saw her parents in a new light because they were very brave. they could have gone elsewhere but they came into london every day. the girls were living at windsor castle, which was very well fortified and the king and then queen elizabeth came and spent many nights there. but they put their lives on the line by going into london. buckingham palace was hit nine times by bombs, one of which almost killed the two of them so

she developed a great admiration for them in their duty and their courage. >> it was sort of a lesson of empathy that most of the royals don't get. >> yes, one of her first private secretary actually noted that. after they'd taken -- well, the whole families when she was still princess elizabeth and they'd taken a trip to south africa, and he said something to that effect that she has -- -- that he noticed an ability to connect with people in a kind of empathy and compassion that was rare. she did see the king's speech. initially she was reluctant to see it because i think she was really nervous seeing her parents portrayed but her cousin margaret rhodes with whom she has gin every sunday and she did see it after it had won the awards. i think people told her the

reaction which was common there and there of applause at the end. and she liked it. she wasn't effusive about it but she thought it was fine but she didn't see the queen. [laughter] >> she made a pact with tony blair and as far as i can tell, she's held to her end there. >> she hasn't seen the queen? >> no. >> she was told about it. yeah. >> i think one of the things that people, you know, talk about being criticized of the queen a bit about, lacking in compassion is one of the things is that the continuing gravitation between her and the royal family and the duke and duchess of windsor, i think that has a lot of times -- they should be invited to like family greetings but they were always excluded. i think there was sort of a comment about that time. >> yeah, well, it was a very traumatic moment when edward the

viii abdicated and her father became king. he had not been prepared for it and he went to his mother and he said i was trained as a naval officer. he did learn to be an admirable king, and i think they -- you know, they did -- well, i think they were tough on them. i think one of the difficulties was the possibility that the duke and duchess of windsor could have lived in england. that would have set up a parallel court. i think it would have been extremely difficult to have an ex-king and a current king living in the same place and for that reason, they wanted them to live in, you know, someplace else and during the war they lived in the bahamas and then afterwards in paris, but i was struck that the queen did reach out to him. he came -- you know, there was a rapprochement and it was at her instigation. he had to come to london for some eye surgery, and she went

and visited him in the hospital. and there was a commemoration for his mother, queen mary, and he was included in that. and when she was making a state visit to paris in 1972, he had already been diagnosed with cancer. and, you know, the queen knew that he did not have long to live. and so she went and she visited him, and it was apparently a very tender visit that they had together and his doctor said she had tears in her eyes and only weeks later he died. and she was very kind to the duchess of windsor -- you know, she was heavily sedated and kind of out of it during that -- during that period of time. but clarissa eden who is the widow of anthony eden said she looked over at one point and saw the queen we are hand on the duchess of windsor's arm and she said she was sort of treating

her with nanny-like tenderness. so i think -- one of her qualities is a tolerance and a compassion forgiveness, and i think she exercised that. there were other members of the family who weren't quite that way. >> thank you. >> here comes somebody. >> i was a passerby but i briefly wanted to inquire -- could you elaborate just a little bit on the blowup over the first lady's wrapped her arm around the queen. >> oh, i have that in the book. i have absolute eyewitness account from the queen's videographer who recorded the whole thing. it was not as big of deal as it was made out to be. what happened was -- as you can imagine there's quite a disparity in height between the

queen and michelle obama and they were standing at this reception with all the g20 leaders. and first of all, they were comparing their shoes. and then they turned to two ladies in waiting who were standing right over there and they started to sort of demonstrate how tall she was and how short she was. and they quite naturally kind of -- as they were showing -- demonstrating this, they put their arms around each other. and, you know, it's long been said that you shouldn't touch the queen, although there have been many people who have over the years and she's become much more relaxed about it. and michelle lingered a bit and rubbed her on the shoulder. nobody took offense except the british tabloid press who decided to make a big deal out of it. but i talked to people at buckingham palace and they said everybody was in a very good mood of the day and it was in the spirit of how everybody felt

so nobody took offense, much less the queen. >> okay. nothing else? >> any other questions? >> no. >> okay. thank you very much for coming. [applause] >> for more information visit the office website sallybedealsmith.com.

>> the book follows these two muslim women of about the same age who became complete opposites and it tells the story of the war on terror through their stories. >> we have seen where power is contained a few hands. they have led to sectarian differences. they have led to a lot of consequential effects. in our history, there were some of the founding fathers who wanted to put the corporation in

the constitution by way of subordinating it to human beings but that provision never got through. you see, at that time, they remembered and they knew about the enormous power, the east india country that ruled india with an iron hand with devastating human casualties. they knew about the hudson bay company, that was in north america. and while the modern form of the corporation was being established with the textile mills some years after the constitution was ratified in england, their reference point was the menacing power of these gigantic corporations. they didn't want to replay in proliferating form in the country that they thought would succeed their constitutional structure in the usa. now, what is important here to

realize there has been a whole series of ways to fight back. they fought back at workers and, they fought back as buyers and shoppers and farmers. they fought back as women. they fought back as slaves. and we have in our history the following ways that they fought back. they fought back trying to use the vote. they fought back with regulation of these companies. you can see the farmer and worker to create some of the foundations of fair labor standards and protecting farmers and the banks to the railroads in the progressive movement. they fought back in the courts winning cases now and then. some of them fought back as owners shareholders. some of them fought back as

cooperatives, a new model that wasn't so commercially determined. it was owned by the farmers, they were owned by the consumers. some of them fought back by organizing rallies and demonstrations. you can see the occupy movement and in that mode at the present time. some of them fought back by striking. some of them fought back by forming unions. some of them fought back by whistle-blowing, by blowing a whistle inside these companies and taking the terrible information to the public, to the prosecuting attorneys or to legislators or to the media. now, because they have fought back, they attracted the attention of various transformations of corporate structure and power. corporations have as their

monomaniacal purpose the aggregation of sales, the aggregation of profits, the aggregation of executive bonuses. and to do that they have to control capital, labor, technology. we're not talking about small business now. small business has its own main street accountabilities. it doesn't have anywhere near the power. they were targeted by these large multinational corporations that now number about 500 real big ones operating globally. and the 1500 or so corporations who control the majority of 535 members of congress getting their way. that's the -- that's the terrain. and these corporations are counseled by very brilliant corporate attorneys, who are really the strategists of the power brokers that are the circle, the accountants and the

publicists and the lobbyists and the shareholder controllers -- all of these are animated and directed by these firms which themselves are concentrated in perhaps 3 or 400 firms. and let's face it, they are geniuses in concentrating power. the creativity of the modern corporate system is probably one of the greatest intellectual achievements, however, nasty, however corrupting, however destructive in american history. they are always dynamically trying to figure out how to blunt, co-op, weaken, undermine or even smear all of these ways i just mentioned to hold these corporations accountable, to hold them responsible. the more they succeed, the more these corporations can be

charged with not delivering an adequate level of economic activity for the people since they control the gateways, since they control the capital labor and technology. and indeed the evidence is truly overwhelming. in 1900 there were a lot of poor people in this country. in the year 2011, there are a lot of poor people in this country. there are a lot of uninsured people for health care in this country. in 1900, there were a lot of uninsured people for health care. the difference is that the worker productivity has increased 25 fold adjusted for inflation per worker. so why is there any poverty? why do 15 million children go to bed hungry at night? why is poverty increasing even though the gross national product continues to increase?

two general reasons, one is power is so concentrated that the wrong things are being produced and the important things are not being produced insufficiency. for example, well distributed health care with a focus on prevention. for example, adequate food supplies with nutrition. for example, public transit of a modern and convenient style. the wrong things that are being produced, huge portion of the economy, making money for money. the paper economy. speculating on top of speculation. the derivatives that keep using other people's money, often pension money, mutual fund money, people's savings by speculators who often don't use their money. they use our money. and they use our money to

generate huge fees and profits that are generally unregulated. so we have, number 1, not the right things are being produced, not the right things in the right way are being produced, environmentally benign ways, recycles ways, precycling ways, perspective to descendent's ways, climate change, acid rain, land erosion, oxygen depletion in the ocean, et cetera. the second aspect, what is produced is very poorly distributed. this is the achilles heel of corporate capitalism because no matter how much is produced in the aggregate, apart from the quality of what's produced and what isn't, the one claim they have to legitimacy is they know how to grow an economy. they know how to build the gdp. they know how to aggregate

capital. and if they can't distribute it in a way to prevent people from slipping behind as they are now, they lose their legitimacy. the highest wage for the majority of workers in this country, adjusted for inflation, was 1973. it has been downhill ever since. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> and now david kennedy, director of the center for crime prevention and control recounts the development and execution of his plan to curb inner city violence in boston in the 1990s. boston's youth murders were cut by two-thirds after installation of the program. and it's now in place in over 70 cities including chicago, washington, dc, and baltimore. this is about an hour. >> good evening, everyone. my name is rachel cass and on

behalf of harvard bookstore i'm very pleased to welcome to you this evening's event with david kennedy, author of the new book "don't shoot, one man a street fellowship and the end of violence in inner city america." tonight's event is just one of many author talks that harvard bookstore is hosting this fall. we have another book talk on jeffery sacks who is director of the earth institute and his new book is "the price of civilization." he'll be speaking at 6:00 pm on friday evening. we also still have tickets on sale for later in the fall for events with newsman jim lehrer and tom brokaw and joan didion among other events so for more information about our fall event series you can email us at harvardbookstore.com. we will have time for questions

from the audience. as this evening's event is being recorded, i would ask if you have a question, you just wait for the audience mic to come to you before you ask it. and i also want to take this moment to remind you to please turn off or silence your cell phone or other electronic devices. it's now my pleasure to introduce this evening's speaker, david kennedy. mr. kennedy is a professor of criminal justice at john j. college as well as director for the center of crime prevention and control. a self-taught criminal nollist he helped engineer the boston miracle in the 1990s by bringing together law enforcement, community leaders and drug traders to cut down on street. violence in boston neighborhoods. his work has been adapted for cities across the country. and has earned him enormous awards into two innovations american government awards at the kennedy school here at harvard. his new book is a memoir of his work develops and implementing his work by understanding and

describing street violence on a theoretical level. a recent online review for the new republic notes, what is brilliant about kennedy's work is its specificity. its insistence that street violence has its own special contours and patterns that can be understood and manipulated. as i said, after the talk we will have time for questions followed by a signing here at the front. as always i'd like to thank anyone who purchases a book here this evening, by doing so, you're supporting both the local independent bookstore as well as this author series. now please join me in welcoming david kennedy. [applause] >> thanks, rachel. good evening. i don't think this is just one in a series of many book events. [laughter] >> just for the record. i like this book