higher education has failed to teach students to be critical thinkers. this india country. look for these titles in bookstores this coming week and watch for the authors in the near future on booktv and booktv.org. on november 49th booktv will sit down with social media writer for clay shirky. you can be a part of the interview, like it on facebook. post your questions on facebook. and watch booktv to hear your questions answer during the live three-hour program. facebook.com/booktv. pulitzer prize winning author alice walker to talk about the lasting impact of the novel "the color purple." it was published in june of

1982. she appeared at george maison university. here's the twenty minute interview on booktv. for thirty years this book has been in bookstores the winner of the pulitzer prize, the national book award. the author is alice walker, the name of the book "the color purple." she joins us at george maison university. thirty years. what are you thoughts about the color purple being around for thirty years. >> it seems so recent in many ways. >> what do you think about it staying power? >> i think it's very real -- relevant to people's lives they get a lot of now richment and self-sense out of it. it's very good for me that it's staying around. >> thirty anniversary.

what is the campus doing? >> well, there is a large celebration of literacy and of learning from books called fall for the book. and i think it will be many wonderful writers talking about how they write, why we write, and communicating with the students and with the people, the townspeople and other people who come to hear us. >> and the whole campus is reading? "the color purple." >> i think and i hope that, you know, they get to the end of it. [laughter] >> what's the -- where did you -- where did color purple come from. >> it came partly because when i was nine and ten i lived with my grandparents, and i loved them very much. i wanted to, as an adult, spend more time with them. of course, they had died. but i wanted to spend time with that kind of ambience of peace and slowness, and live to the

experiences. they have lived wildlifes as younger people. i wanted to get in to this so i could know them better. >> your most recent book is the "chicken chronicles." are you raising chickens? >> i am raising chickens. >> at your home in the strisk san francisco. >> and there are fifteen of them. and a rooster who has a name of howie. i named him after howard zimmerman who was a great friend we lost last year. i love raising them. they are great wonderful beings. >> what y are you raising chickens. what attracted you? >> they are part of my growing up. and i had lost touch with them. i needed to be back on the farm, back with farm animals that i had known as a child because i wanted to reaffirm my relationship to really the

animal world. >> alice walker you have written with a what twenty books? >> thirty something. >> when people see you they immediately go to the color purple. >> yes. how do you feel about that? >> i think it's my ancestors doing. i credit my ancestors many ways with the success of the book. i did it out of a love for them. and i feel they think, she took good care of us in the book. i haven't heard any claimant from them. i think they want to take care of me by being this signal to other people that here is someone who is writing, and so i feel very happy about it because otherwise who knows. i mean, it's possible that no one would know anything about my work. >> alice walker, you talk about color purple going from the religious to the spiritual. what does if mean? >> it means for me my spiritualty is rooted in nature. it's not about organized

religion at all. i wanted to share that with people in the book. it's a though theological book. it's about who is god. god can never be the traditional christian god. it doesn't work even though i was raised as methodist in the christian church. so i wanted to affirm for people that we come here with our intuition about what is define intactd. we all have that. all of us. well, most of us. we should have more faith in it the beauty of the earth is devine. this is, you know, we live in. heaven already. so that was partly what i'm exploring in the "color purple." >> at one point in your life did you decide a christian god wasn't for you. >> well, when i was 13 my parents and family always twoabtd church, i decided that found my church in nature, and my parents by then, i was the last child so they were too

tired to force me to go to church with them as they had done with my seven siblings who are holder. i got to stay home. while they in were in the tiny church, which is a sweet little church, seemed to be so little compared to the universe, and i wanted to be in the whole thing, you know. i used to sit in church and look at the window how big, you know, how grand the heaven is that we already have. i stayed home and i would run around the house and look at, you know, storms coming, for instance, i loved the way waves would appear in the sky. they used to look exactly like ocean waves, and it would start to rain. what incredible imagine. what divinity there. it seemed very clear to me that for me it's all of it that is god. it's not something that you can make so small you can stick it in a church and think by going there every sunday you get it. that seemed just impossible.

even as a 13-year-old. >> we spent a couple of hours in your home a couple of years ago for our in-depth program. thank you for that. but the first question i asked you was about gardens. you always write about gardens. >> i always write about gardens because gardens were always in my life. my mother was a fantastic gardener, and i continued trait tradition. and i love the idea i can partly sustain myself by growing my own food. i do. i have all kinds of vegetables, fruits, and trees. at this particular time for everyone. i want everyone in the planet to immediately start digging somewhere and planting things to love but also to eat. because, you know, this is our mother. and she can sustain us. but we have to work. >> now, with your chicken chronicles, you talk about as a child that one of your jobs was to chase them down for sunday

dinner and wring their necks. do you . >> do i? no i don't. i do eat chickens though. i don't eat my chickens. >> your chickens are pets. >> no. they are individuals. and actually the first batch died. i only have two of the first batch. did you know they only about three years. i had no idea. i thought my chickens and i would live they would live maybe twenty years and we would go off in the sunset together. i discovered they a short life. and i started finding them dead, you know, just in the chicken yard. they just dropped dead from old age. a lot of predators got some of them, but they have a short life. >> so what you do you do with your chickens? eggs do you eat the eggs? >> yes, we do eat the eggs. for the rest of them, they either die, they are eaten by predators or we give them away.

and we don't ask when we give them away what they are going to do with them. >> back to the thirty i.t. anniversary of the color purple. what did you think of the musical. >> the musical fan theysha. >> the musical with fan theysha. >> i liked awe the people who were in the color purple. to me she wasn't as much as character at others. she was bigger. that's one of the things that can happen when you're collaborating with, you know, people making a musical or a film. they choose, they tend to choose the people that they, you know, they see will who will have a big drawing power. but she was wonderful. but not really the ceeley i envisioned. >> when you get invited to speak at the english class or university. how many times do you accept the invitation. do you have a set or standard peach speech that you give the student. >> i never had a standard

speech. i never really know what i'm going until i get there. oftenly choose a few things that seem to me rising the top things. you go somewhere and you think, what is really what seems to be worth sharing today? and that will rise to the top. usually in meditation, but i don't have a set speech, no. >> when you spoke here at george maison, what rose to the top? >> well, i have a -- it hasn't happened yet. it's still coming. i'll read the color purple, i think people expect that. ly talk about that. but i also want to read a piece that i did about marrying two good men. i was ordained as a minister to marry this cup. -- couple. it was a wonderful experience. i loved them and they asked me even though one of the men his father was a quaker minister who could have done it.

for reason they preferred to had to scare have me do it. i wanted to share it with people. i think i -- especially at the university it needs to be affirmed that love is love you know, and that we if we can have community around, you know, having me married them was a part of stlent p strengthening the global community of loving couples. >> what's the most frequent question you get from students? >> why is it called "the color purple" and i say, the long winded response is that purple is a color that you think is really rare. i mean, all the colors are rare. you think purple is pretty rare and you don't see it. while i was writing the book, in nature a lot. especially flit redwoods and by the river walking by the ocean and all of that. i started to see that actually

it's everywhere. it's just that often you don't see it. it's one of those colors, you know, that kind of fades in to other colors or it's on the underside ever something like in shells with for instance. shells are often red with purple. in this way, it's like the people in the book. you don't see them, they are wherever. all the things that are happen income this that book. they are everywhere. they are not just in my culture, in american culture. they are all over the globe, you know, the way that women are treated, the way are children are seen. and the awakening which is the most important part. all over the globe, especially now people are awakingenning to the reality they have lead often by religions, organized religion in directions that are lethal to them. absolutely lethal. soul denying, spirit crushing, you know, mind numbing. and so what to do about that?

and i think when they read the "color purple." they see someone who is drown toeden and looking around and sees i belong to the universe. i don't belong to whoever bought me. i belong to the god of everything. >> you recently didn't allow an israeli person on the "color purple" to be published. >> it's been published in israel before. there was a cultural boycott of israel it's an appar tide country. and this was decided at the tribunal last year in cape town south africa. i was a juror which i got to hear the testimony. it was absolutely hideous. i had been to the west bank and gaza, i have seen how arabs are treated and muslims are treated. and it's just sooch like what happened here in the south. it's incredible. and we support this government

is almost unbelievable. >> if people were no to -- to read a different book of there what would you recommend? >> "the temple of my familiar." it's much more -- in a way, i feel like my ancestors gave me the "color purple" as an expression of them. and then they that book permitted me to have the gift of my own time to encounter in "the temple of my familiar." has the special thirtieth anniversary edition been published. >> i think so. i don't know. >> they don't tell you? [laughter] >> you have to know my life. i'm not really glued to much. [laughter] i'm not. you know, i have to admit, i just someone was saying to me yesterday, i said to them when i was approached by steven spielberg to make the film.

i had never heard of him. and they said, how is that possible. and i said, well, it's because i don't live in a life where i know the kl churl icons. and i don't. there are many things i just i don't relate to. so i don't know. >> how incognito can you be? >> i can be very incog tee know. behind these big glasses. are you kidding? >> unless you credit card with your name on it, you're . >> yeah. >> the attitude, you know. if you take the position that you just here. you're just a human being and, you know, all of this stuff that people think about you is their business. it really is. but you have a life, you know, that is satisfying to you. and i'm very much in to my dog. i have a little dog, a little your key, charlie. and honestly he is pretty much

-- i do have new books coming out. >> we'll get to those. i want to ask about your most recent, the chicken chronicles. why did you name one of chickening a us in of god? >> i love the name. i decided to call her that. yeah. >> how is she doing? >> agnes of god. who was a bard rock chicken. gray and black white checkered kind of thing. she was close with ruffa. they were terrorizers of the other chickens. one day i came down to look at the chickens and agnes was missing. we found a feather way out in the woods, and we said, oh, agnes of god is gone. and we were encode mourning, you know, even though he was a terrorizinger.

but then the next day i went down to see them, and who should stroll but agnes of god. and she had not been eaten by a predatory. she was just like, yeah, i know you thought i was gone. i'm back. but the fanal lee of this and the sad part the next week she did disappear. so that's a little story chicken . >> speaking of pets when we spent time at your home with you a couple of years ago, a dog wandered on to the scene at the very end. >> miles. >> miles is miles still around? >> miles davis larson is still around. the coyote he was. the wonderful korea koreature. what are you working on now? >> i have a huge man script of my new book, which is "the cushion and the road" meditation and wandering as the whole world

understands we are all in harm's way. that's what i'm doing on the trip. when i'm not doing this. i am working on the man manuscript. it has to be back by october 9th. that's soon. >> where did it come from if. >> i'm basically a con team playtive and i meditate and had designed my little meditation space in mexico with a cushy looking out in to screenty and peace. but i discovered the world kept calling and i kept responding and i was trying to figure how i could bring them together. the call of the world and needing to sit on my cushy. i had this dream in which when i was my grandfather and i used to watch the cars go by in the little country road and he would choose the red, and i would choose the blew. it was one of the long straight

georgia highways, you know. in my dream there in the middle of the highway was my cushy, my rose colored meditation cushy. i think my dream world was trying to telling me i can travel the world, but my cushy, you know, will have to be a traveling cushy. >> and the will be out next spring. >> yes. we've been talking here with alice walker at george mason university where the entire campus is reading in fact "the the campus provided students with the "the color purple." you would like to see more allies walker. booktv spent three hours with her. you can go to booktv.org type in alice walker in the left-hand side corner. we were at her home. thank you for spending a little

more time with booktv. >> thank you. you're watching booktv. on c-span2, 48 hours of non-fiction authors and books every weekend. >> i want to talk you about it about my book strong thur monoin america. i want to begin by telling you of my story. when you go and do research in south carolina, and you go to archives and people ask you what you're interested in writing about, and you tell thurmond. tell me your story. you can't throw a stone in south carolina without hitting somebody that has a great story about him. the time they did something for him or did something crazy. my story begins in the late july 1992. and i'm on a flight from washington, d.c., to charlotte,

north carolina. i had been an intern that summer on capitol hill. and one of my regrets of the summer was that i never seen strom thur thurmond. there's an unusual appearance. i didn't know they meant. i had my -- i'm on the flight and look ahead and front of me. i see a man who has the orange-colored hair. practically. it was brightly colored the first generation hair plugs and it shows you how slow i am. i this to myself that must be what strom's head looks like. it was strom. i knew that when people were reaching other and, you know, trying to . >> i wanted to shake his hand too. i've been in d.c. that summer for the first time, and i met all of these politicians i'd seen on tv. it was a great thrill. i was about to go home and speak my dad's rotary club putted to

tell them about the famous people i net washington, d.c. and so i was going try to shake his hand when i got off the plane, but as i got iewf the plane, there were people already lined up to shake his hand. and and i didn't get in line. and i didn't, you know, i was thinking, i i wasn't a constituent. i wasn't from south carolina. u i also to be honest it was self-conscious. it was a busy airport. there were lot of different kinds of people. i was self-conscious about standing in line to meet. i thought it was good enough to say i seen him and keep on walking. i'm conflicted though. i'm conflicted. i walk down the concourse 100 years and i look back everybody dispersed and here's the -89d-year-old man at the time. he has a suitcase, a briefcase in one hand and travel bag in

the other and a package under one arm and just shuffling down the busy crowded airport. and without thinking, go back and introi deuce myself and i said, senator thurmond. i'll be happy to get you to the your next flight. you sure you have enough time. i don't want to delay you in your own travel. i have plenty of time. i'd be happy. i picked up the backs and we walked together for about ten minutes. i was trying to make conversation. and i told them about the people i met that summer, and he said, nice things about the various colleagues i met and that kind of thing. i told him i was on my way to scare -- i had a girlfriend from florence south carolina. i said some silly comment about south carolina girls. i guess because the small talk one made with strom strom thurmond. get him to his flight and shook his hand again. that was it. i thought about that story a lot as i have written this book.

that story really the metaphor for the difficulty i had in writing about this -- the challenge i faced in writing about this very controversial figure. there's no easier or straightforward way to write about a figure as controversial as strom thurmond. sometimes as i've been reading the book we wondered if some of the stuff in the book is not another effort on my part to carry strom thurmond's back age. -- the challenge i had in the weak was to fight the urge not kind of, you know, simply walk away and not meet the man face to face, you know, and present him as a kind of three dimensional contract. a living breathing human being. that's the challenge i fashion. what i wanted to do, really, is write a book about -- write a

history of strom thur monday's america in a way that critical but dissipation gnat wait. that would shed light on some of the issues that shape each of our own america today. i hope in doing so you can add a sense of measure 77 reason and dispangs to these issues pa embroil our politics today and divide us. that was the goal. that's the -- as it were. what are the big issues. what are the issues that by history of strom thurmond's america speak to. we remember. a lot of us remember who he was. he was the 1948 dixie presidential candidate. he was one of the lead authors of the 1956 southern manifest tow which is the protest of the supreme court decision in a brown v board of education

decision in 1954. he is the record holder to the day of the longest one man filibuster. in the begin necessary book of world words 24 hours and 18 minutes he spoke against the 1957 civil rights bill. we remember him as one of the last jim crow demagogue. he was that. what we forget about thurmond. he was also one of the first of the sun belt conservative. what do i mean by that? what is that? the sun belt, it's one of the big stories, one of the major storiesed in the history of 20th century american politics. and that is the flow of jobs, of industries, resources and pop police station sphrt state of the midwest and the -- in the post world war ii period.

they were recruiting in list i are. they were passing right to work laws. they eve ising lots of funding from the federal government to build military at the time when the united states was involved in the cold war against the soviet union. so states like mississippi, states like georgia, texas, arizona, and north carolina are being transformed in the post world war ii period by this historic shift in population and political influence. think about it. this really this period from 1964 to stwaight can be thought of as the period of sun belt dominance in american presidential history. if you think about every president elected from 1964 from 2012 comes from the state from the sun belt. richard nixon from california. gerald ford was never elected he doesn't count. he was from michigan. jimmy cart -- -- it end the

forty years period of sun belt dominance. there were issues critical in the politics that go oned that came out of the sun belt. they tended to have a conservative cast to them. they tended to be oriented around issues of strong national defense of an opposition to unions and defense of free enterprise politics and it's in the sun belt in the south and southwest we see the rise by the 1970 would be coming to as at religious rise. the rise of e van gel call and the political process and new and important ways. so thurmond was the forefront at all of those issues in the own politicses. national defense he was a staunch anticommunist and played a important role in right-wing

anticommunist politics. it was one of the things that lead him to switch parties in 1964. he was a key figure in opposing labor unions. he did so alongside bike barry goldwater starting in the 1950s. early in the career he would be a staunch advocate for unions in south carolina back in the '0s and '40s when the union vote was an important vote. he switches in the 50s and '60s he becomes a die hard support are of business and aalready. he is important role in conservative politics. he joins the board of bob jones university in 1950. he does it to win votes in the country of south carolina. bob joandz had moved to the country of south carolina. moved the university and thurmond needed votes in the upcountry of south carolina. he lost the 1950 race in the