now on booktv, the before columbus foundation presents the winners of the 35th annual american book awards in san francisco, california. >> thank you very much. my name is justin, i'm the chairman of the board of directors before columbus. and i want to thank our friends here at sf jazz for their sponsorship of this afternoon's awards, and my colleagues on the board of directors for their

presence and persistence and devotion to this very worthy and necessary and urgent, and i would say even medicinal, organization. at the beginning of this year, in january, united states lost one of its most innovative and exciting writers, baracka. twice winner of the american book award, who is a strong supporter of the before columbus foundation. in fact, his last appearance here in san francisco was at a fundraiser at yossi's, not far from here to raise money for the before columbus foundation. so, in our embrace, of the arc and an -- panorama of american

art and history i want to dedicate my portion of the program to the memory of a poet and writer, ameri baraka. we have quite a harvest this afternoon. and we're honored by the presence of many of the most fertile writers. who offer illumination and insight, and as i mentioned, a few moments ago, some very strong medicine, and some very ill times. so, before we get into that, i'd like to start with a gentleman, good friend, who can't be with us today, but he received the american book award for very important work, "breach of

trust." how americans failed their soldiers and their country, by andrew basovich. now, some of the most egregious journalists on television and in print have been cheerleading and saber rattling this country into war now for a very long time, and among the most venal at the "new york times," david brookes. he is just one. but the responsibility of journalists to present an honest representation of the relationship between the united states and the rest of the world, has utterly fallen by the wayside. there are very few who still

present us with rigorous, inventive, and deciphering journalism about our relationship with the rest of the world. andrew is one of those people. in this book, squarely puts much of the onus on us as citizens and journalists as well. so, in accepting the award for andrew basocech i'll read a few words he sent us he would like to share with you. to have "breach of trust" react needed alongside the other books being honored a source of great personal satisfaction to me. i apologize nor not being here in person. my teaching schedule did not permit me to attend. as we all know, writing is hard work, and it's work undertaken with no real expectation of actually being read.

much less understood, and appreciated, so an award like this is a welcome indicator of having been heard at least in some quarters. it's the sort of thing that encourages you to keep at it when you get up in the morning. there are many untold stories that deserve to be told, and many overlooked and underreported issues that demand greater attention than they receive. i don't for a second pretend that the story i'm telling in this book, and the issues it explores, are uniquely important, but like it, or not, ours is a country that has embraced military power with something lick wreck his abandon. the vast majority of our fellow citizens have come to expect we must remain not simple police militarily powerful but militarily supreme. not just now but in per

perpetuity. our political establishments is dedicated tot that proposition, democrats and republicans alike. in my view, this expectation that emerged in the wake of the cold war has produced exceedingly pernicious results. one of the most pernicious of awful is the fraudulent relationship between the american people and their soldiers, with something close to unanimity americans profess to support the troops inch reality we're complicit in their abuse, committing them to open-ended ward that are both unnecessary and mismanaged, breach of trust examines that relationship, and suggests an alternative, more in line with the values we profess. thank you again for this recognition, i'm exceedingly grateful. andrew basocech. [applause] >> so, now i'd like to introduce

a colleague on the board of directors at before columbus foundation, poet, activist, writer, jenny lem. [applause] >> great to see everybody here. this next recipient of the american book award also was not able to join us today. her name is joan cain. she is an inuit from anchorage, alaska, from king island and mary's igloo. she received the writer's award for first book of poetry and recently received the native arts and cultures foundation literature fellowship among many other honors. joan says she is one of the best poets of her generation, and at the top of the next wave of

indigenous poets. joan cain. i want to read a little bit of a quote from gc got her book. >> have headed on the bruised slope in these vivid disturbing and mysterious poems written in english and joan writes out of the landscape and language of the far north, situate at a threshold between cultures, between inner and outer worlds, and the poems are voiced with a knife blade the throats swell. her compelling vision is earned through a language that will dislocate in order to relocate and whose tonal shifts are exact and exacting. excuse me. that was a quote from arthur z. and now, let's switch to thomas mcgovern and juan delgado.

it's my pleasure to introduce these two authors, delgado and mcgovern traveled together into the desolate, yet vibrant desertscape of san bernardino, of the heart of california, the neon, once lit signs and faded murals, once with the spark of the painter, and neighborhood. yet the places, paces and traces still alive, speak through the still frames, intimate and closeup portraits, documents, narratives, meditations, and all of a sudden we move, we pick up the step and me an -- through another map. the unusual for cartographies of the barrios. they're not really faded or worn. they keep on in one long poem, and one long image, accordions before the chalk soft walls, hair styling salons, barber

shops, streets, parking lots. we're the cautiousness of the people and places that continue. we are the heroes they say standing up. let us applaud this great task of vital, the signs of our times, bravo, and delgado and mcgovern. and that was a quote from the poet laureate of california, juan filipe herrera has no other person could say it. [applause] >> your kodak moment. >> that's right. >> congratulations. >> thank you so much. >> thank you so much.

>> yes, of course. >> you wonder why we're just standing here, right? >> i thought it was a san bernardino oakland thing, you know? >> you poets are into these slams and all that. >> you know, i just want to thank obviously the foundation and ishmael and justin and gail and everybody for recognizing our book, vital signs. at least juan had the good sense to actually bring a copy. thank you. also, i'd like to thank -- we'd like to thank marian mitchell wilson, the executive director of the inlanda foundation and they're the first group i brought the photographs to and asked them do you think you could support this as a book? she said yes. when she mentioned that that, said aid love to work with juan delgado and she was very excited. i not a this idea of the collaboration between my mavs and juan's poetry would be something that would resonate

with thinks. we want to thank our publisher, mary, publishist that helped us get the work out there a lot. juan's wife, jean, who is fabulous, and a big supporter and his biggest critic and as my wife, who also is probably my biggest critic and my biggest supporter, ultimately we would also thank our colleagues at cal state san bernardino, former president, al carmug. and just before i let juan squeeze his words in here, i'd like to just comment about how fraught the idea of doing a collaboration is and how difficult that is, and it's like magic. you think it's going to work and a lot of times it doesn't and yet with juan, who i often times refer to him as like a brother from another mother, we seem to have found that perfect sort of combination between respect and

love and criticism and insight to hopefully make this collaboration one that will even last. >> thank you, tom. i want to acknowledge tom and the partnership. we spent many hours driving through cities looking at murals. cops thought we were caging the place to rob it. and then all the street life. they would say you want this, want to buy that? it was interesting. one of the great benefits of our partnership is we know all the best places to eat in our town. >> fabulous. >> so, we might start a taco tour with the book. go to all the cool places to eat. so, i just want to read a poem and kind of dedication to the ceremony today, and specifically i want to dedicate it to a couple people. we grew up -- i grew up in neighborhoods that had a lot of -- like neighborhood moms, where if you did something two

blocks away your mom knew before you got home. and so -- and we lived in scary places, but these women kept the place safe for us. and so i -- our book is really a love poem to the city, but it's also a love poem to the people who keep that city together. i totally understand oakland because most people see us between just a gas station stop between l.a. and palm springs. so they kind of -- we're in the shadow of those other places, and this poem is called the c notes, which is neighbored, dedicated to fabulous writers and some i've been following for many years. i'm honored to be here and some i'm meeting for the first time. and it's also dedicated to cuban poet, nicholas guion, you have to know his work. havefully influenced by lang song hughes, so there's a little spanish in here remember so the

c notes. like the santa yous that -- they take not their plastic rosaries. they smell like the wooden buies of the corner churches. unlike us, they're not afraid or scared at living aqui. they spit out the thorns of their past, not even to their laziness like their -- they stitch and patch new families together, when driven beyond their own. [applause] >> thank you so much. we appreciate it.

>> thank you very much. one of the most wonderful things about working with before columbus is discovering through my colleagues on the board many of the books that would otherwise not come my way, and unique work of history, american history, that has been balanced with exceptional love and logic great empathy and intuition, and courage, comes to us this year from a gentleman, jonathan scott

holloway. this book, jim crow wisdom, memory and identity in black america since 1940, presents its own set of spiritual challenges to the reader, to confront so much of the history of our nation that has been violently suppressed. but the author again through courage and intuition and empathy helped us along that way, through his own personal discoveries and so it creates a very unique and sometimes startling form for a work of history. a great honor to welcome to the stage, jonathan scott holloway. [applause]

>> thank you for that lovely introduction and summation. part of what justin was referring to i think, about the become being a little bit different as a book of history, is that it doesn't -- historians might not consider it a book of history. i began the book as a third person narrative. i then got stuck for three years when a book dealing with memory -- when my family memories kept invading a book on other people's memories. and after three years i gave myself permission, maybe because i ran out of ideas, to use the first person, so the first and third person are interwoven in a way that i think gives a certain new texture to this particular history. i want to actually in

acknowledging method, though, turn to another author, named tony earling. writes beautiful history of southeastern united states, mostly north carolina. in his book somehow form a family connection of collection of essays. he tells the story when he was about nine years old, growing up very poor, with a father who was consistently disappointing him, never following through on his amazing promises. hetles the story of being very excited about watching the moon shot. the apoll low moon shot, and hoping somehow to get a telescope to see the moon. when neil armstrong was on the face of it. his father promised he would do it, and his father, young tony, was convinced would fall through. -- would not follow through. excuse me. but on the evening of the mon shot, when neil armstrong was walking on the moon, his father showed up with an instrument through which he could see the

moon, and young tony imagined he saw neil armstrong walking on the surface of the moon. the adult tony writing the story of the moment of his father's final arrival, coming through with a promise, he sends it off to the harper's, and the fact checker writes back and says, mr. early -- i skipped an important fact -- young tony said he imagined seeing neil armstrong walking on the surface of the moon and the fact checker writes back, mr. early, that mon was a waxing crescent. the adult tony early said this is the most powerful memory of my childhood. the one time my father actually came through. the moon was full. but then decided to check the records. the map was a walking crescent -- the moon was a waxing crescent. the adult tony early said even though he know the fact there is that the moon was not full, to this day that moon is very full in his imagination.

he highlights in that moment for me the tension between history, the waxing crescent, and memories, that full moon. they're irreconcilable, and in summation for me, that is so much of the african-american experience itself. irreconcilable. so, crafting that book, that stretched me beyond my boundaries as a historian, was not a task that came to me just by myself. i have to thank my first editor at university of north carolina pressure, sean hunter, who saw what the book could be before i could and she gave me permission to do something different. i want to also thank the students who taught me along the way. students always teach for teachers. one of the students who taught me, the friends who supported me, and my family, who was very determined to share their memories. in particular i want to thank my

late mother, two taught me to listen, listen to everyone-especially those whose stories were too often written out of history. and the final thanks to my father, who after reading the book, i did not share this with my family in the years of its creation -- but who after reading the book gave me the best review could i have hoped to receive. he said, in this is a direct quote, i never knew my life would matter. now i know it has. thank you all for your support for this project, this strange experiment of mine, the most personal book i've ever written, and one that i hope resonates with others as well. thank you very minute. [applause]

>> i think that quote really struck a chord, and i believe that's why we are here, because with many of these authors and books, we didn't really realize we mattered until we expressed our histories through poetry, research, history that set distortions right. so, thank you very much for saying that. mr. holloway. i also want to acknowledge, as justin acknowledged, ameri baraka and his phenomenal contributions to the literary world and a voice that addressed issues that would never have been addressed in the way they were, whether it was his books on blues and jazz, his poetry, his plays. i want to acknowledge my peer sisters who i've read and miss

so much. jane cortez, powerful poet, and juan decoleman we lost in the last year, as well as my peer, fred ho, who some say was the face of asian-american jazz and spoke about the connection between asians and africans and their histories of oppression, and that he found he expressed through his music combining the asia esthetic with the african esthetic. so, yes, women do hold up half the sky and men hold up the other half. another awardee who wasn't able to join us and i really want to thank those of you who made the trip here from across the country to be here with us, and this author is nick turse. he says, it's an incredible honor to be recognized with an american book award.

when i look back on the list of past winners from daniel else burg to chalmers, johnson, eduardo galliano, to tony morrison, my fellow recipients this year, i find myself humbled. it's true lay select company, and i couldn't be more grateful to the before columbus foundation for bestowing this great honor upon me. my only regret is i cannot be here in person. i spent ten years researching and writing "kill anything that moves." ten years accruing debts of gratitude i can never truly repay that but that i would like to recognize here. i want to thank all the many funders who supported my work and allowed me to write "kill anything that moves." including the fund for investigative journalism, harvard university's radcliffe institute, new york university center for the united states and the cold war, and the simon -- john simon google home memorial foundation as well as nation

institute and its investigative fund and sarah bershtel and metropolitan books. i owe so many other people a real debt of gratitude, far to many to thank here but none more so than my wife, tamara, an exceptionally talented journalist who reported with me. i want to close by explosion gratitude to all those who truly made me work possible. over repeated trips to vietnam i had the distinctive stink honor to spiff with hundreds of men and women whose courage, strength of character, resilience, openness and bravery, continually left me in state of awe. i spoke with survivors of massacres, rapes and torture, people who had endured almost unspeakable brutality. i dropped in and out of the blue and asked these people to talk about the most horrific events imaginable. the most terrible days of their

lives, and they, in turn, opened up to a stranger, from a country that so wronged them. at the end of the ordeal they irvariably thanked me for my efforts itch was continually stunned by the response and remain so today. i share this great honor with all those who shared so much with me. thank you. nick turse. [applause] >> now, with someone who is here and i'm so proud and happy to have met him, coon woon. he was published for his book, "water chasing water" in 2013. described by bob holeman as lep noh drag, the voice of new america. you can just imagine that

visually. woon exploded on to the poet the scene in 1990s. self-taught, struggle with homelessness, he wrote bat the back alis and tenement rooms on the margin of immigrant culture. his firs collection, the truth in rent rooms, including in this volume, won a pen poetry prize. water chasing water is woons second collection and continues his explore asia lobeliness and memory with poems andes says that seek out this life without which existence is not detectable. woon, according to steve cannon, director of a gathering of tribes, says woon, like bob kaufman, is a writer of solituded but his solitudes contain mulitudes.

join woon in his imaginings and enter into his room. russell yong says, like the angel island poems carved in barrackses. oon's poems possess a moral intention that is part of the consciousness of struggling peoples everywhere. i'd like to bring up here, koon woon. [applause] >> i think the greatest things i can give to all the ordinary

people of this planet, they just live and try to ensure that future generations live. i grew up in a village without running water. i spent nine years. we collected dog dung, also dung, anything that we could use as fertilizer, so we discover organic farming 100 years before you guys. [laughter] >> however, my book has -- came out of a lot of terrible times, but in -- but terrible times will give you strength. i told myself, if you can endure your feeling just a little bit longer, you will live. you do not have to commit suicide. the morning is always the next day, and a lot of people help me

with this book. i cannot give enough thanks to the people in china in hong kong, in this country, people who are homeless, people who in universities, i've met people who graduated from harvard, who went to the advance institute in princeton. i find that in some ways they're no different from anybody else but they're singular-minded and they want to achieve the best achievement is for helping humanity, even one iota. so this is a very great gratification for me. and i especially like to thank betty preebe who is not here anymore, and the person i'd next like to thank the most is lee, editor and publisher. she has known me and worked with me for almost 20 years.

if not for her optimism and encouragement these books would have never come out and the world may not have ever known me, even though i'm the cowsson of gary lock, the ambassador to china. thank you very much. [applause] >> strong medicine. and we need it. >> there's nothing new in the united states for race to be represented in popular culture as some kind of ideological merchandise for people to use, to stake out political positions, to oppose each other or to misinterpret their own

relationship with each other. journalists, filmmakers, television, radio, record companies, have been doing this from the very beginning, or even from before the beginning. but more recently, the last four years, hollywood and it's cultural products have turned itself to the issue of slavery in it's attempt to turn us into infants. now, to go along with that, is the same extent to which one is either ignorant, a child, or insane, or maybe some combination of those three. armand white, a critic, wasn't going for the okey domestic when

it came to these slavery film products. and as a result of that. through a group conspiring in mid-town man hat to write a hit piece which was later proven to be wrong, that some how armand had heckled the people who hoisted this product on to us, he was removed from his position as the head of the new york film critics circle. so, in recognizing that, but in also recognizing one of our most innovative writers, the before columbus foundation has chosen to award armand white this year the anticensorship award. now, armand very much wanted to be with us today. he wasn't able to come out, and in a moment ishmael reed is going to come to accept armand's award for him, as was arm yapped's wishes, but before bringing ishmael back to stage i would like to read you what

armand would like to share. i am extremely gratified by this tribute from the before columbus foundation, and the american book awards. for me, it recognizes the work i've done as a cultural critic and against the odds of mainstream as extra simple -- disrespect. there is pressure to make writers conform and stop any independent meaningful expression. down through methods such as definition of character, but it won't work. i'm emboldened by the support of many and still believe in speaking truth to power, an ethic i learned from the examples of pioneer strugglers, from ida b. wells and george skylar, to harold cruz, and pauline kale.

i thank gautt god that justin and ishmael understood the essence of my own struggle, even from as far away as the west coast. and reached out to me. it makes up for all the small-minded slander and indifference, and i am enormously encouraged. i salute your own courage and insight in standing up against censorship. armand white. in accepting the award, ishmael reed. [applause] >> i really mess up when i have jet lag so robert anderson, was right the first time. asked me to write a essay commemorating their 150th 150th anniversary. i wrote the essay, and they said

they weren't expecting it. the title of the essay was "when black guys mess up, everybody gets paid." so, we black men enhance the cotton industry, which made more profits than all of the other industries at the time. railroads, banks, put together. we enhanced cable, the cable industry. i wrote an essay called "the black pathology business." everybody is getting pay. cnn, they miss o.j. i wrote a novel with o.j. in the background, could, "juice." government my best review in china. pretty much misunderstood here. and one of the critics said that everybody is over that. you got to tell that to the espn crew that came to my house a

couple weeks ago for five hours. they're doing five hours of o.j. next year. a series. so, some of the critics who don't get paid, like armand white, challenge this big shaming black business, shaming. like, for example, just this morning, i saw melissa hair harris' show and they talk about the scandal at north carolina university, the cheating scandal. one black football player's picture was up there. i was surprised to learn that 52% of those were fraternity people who cheated. i didn't see their pictures. so there's been a big role since "the color purple" which has been duplicated by "precious." the sequel. one comedian said he expected a "color purple" on ice. people making so much money. now, you now knew i was going to

get to that. finally, people didn't realize that alice walker also objected to the film interpretation of her novel. that is in "step neglect same river twice." so all dividend were brought in and checks were cashed she was against it. thank you. so, there has to be someone to take charge, and to mention as george bernard shaw said, if you do not tell your own stories, others will tell them for you, and they will vulgarize and degrade you. the last group you can jump on, the last white ethnic group you can jump on in movies and televisions, italians. so, armand white objected to "precious." the worst film ever made about black life. matter of fact, ronald reagan could have written the script. maybe he did. came back, had a lucid moment

and wrote the script for "precious" because in that, the black pathology business is extented to black women. before 9 was black men. now black women. not only as a black male a problem in the movie, but the black woman is also accused of, when you're around eating bad food and all the stereo types we have gotten from republican party and the tea party nor last few decades. armand white objected to "12 years a slave." when i kind the term, slave anyway temperaturetive, didn't know everybody would make money but me. we had a whole proliferation of movies about slavery books, theater about slavery. he called it torture porn i agree. he also mentions that the roles that were designated for

african-americans were played by frick yaps. i asked woody king hall, he said they're scared to saying anything in hollywood about it. isn't it ironic that maybe the die scent dents of people who sold us into slavery get to play african-american actors or -- people who are enslaved. for his courage and ability to criticize this movie, he was cast out of the -- the new yorks critic circle. i think he was the only black person there he was the chair. i see. they cast him out. very proud to accept this award for a very courageous critic and cultural critic and personality, armand white. thank you very much. [applause]

>> thank you. michael berenti is one of the greatest writers this country ever produced. as a historian, he is preeminent interpreter of our times. and like the greatest historians, he is able to illuminate our present moment with a very, very fine, careful weaving in of the past, the present, and moving with tremendous momentum toward the future. he has an undeniable sense of reality and he speaks with tremendous authority of feeling. with nearly two dozen books, what he has offered our world is absolutely beautiful and

extraordinary. we are very, very proud at before columbus to honor michael berenty with the american book award for lifetime achievement. [applause] >> you could have kept going on. that was such a beautiful introduction. now come this massive anticlimax here. okay. so, i did prepare few words here. i'm actually enduring a sigh sciatica attack right now. if i start climbing on this thing it's not because of the passion and all this. and it's a wonderful, wonderful thing to get this award, and i

really appreciate it. i had interesting reactions when people e-mailed me, saying, it's about time. you're more deserving of this, and all that stuff, and i've actually gotten a number of awards along the way. i think it's picked up lately, and i think what happened it got out i'm 81 years old, so everyone is saying, oh, oh, 81? that hard to believe. 81. and i'm reminded of studs terkel, when he was being interviewed on the radio one time, he was 94, and he is just getting ready to check out, and he said, there's three stages -- studs terkel -- he worked out of chicago but he was a new york boy, i want you to know. he said, there's three stages in a man's life. youth, middle age, and you are looking great. so, that's me.

i'm looking great. yeah, yeah, yeah. oh, 78? you think 78? okay. well, in my life i ran into a lot of problems when i was writing, a lot of years where i was -- i've been kicked out of some of the best university in america because of my politics and political activism, and when i meet people now and they ask me what i do, i say i'm a recovering academic. what i did in my writing and my speaking, is i often crossed forbidden lines. i went all the way with my political analysis, often to appreciative readers and listeners, and also to mainstream notables who would take umbrage of what i would say

and even many who claim to be left of the main stream. it's surprise ought mainstream they really are. speaking of mainstream notables. it's no accident it came up in my mind. an interview i heard with daniel worsen. american historian. missuper patriot. any issue that came along, the supreme court, the this, the constitutional convention, he would say, isn't it the greatest in the world? aren't we just wonderful to be americans? isn't this just wonderful? everything is so great. i heard him on the radio -- talk about apropos. i heard him on the radio and remembered the interview. he was talking about columbus and the work -- i hope the foundation appreciates my timeliness -- he is talking about columbus and the

remarkable work that club columbus did and opened up a whole civilization, saved western civilization and gave it a new dimension, did this, and columbus, so, somebody at the end, in the q & a, somebody said, you know, columbus was a plunderer and a slaver. he put people in slavery. and borst n answered saying, yes, want to remind you that columbus -- christopher columbus did not have the naacp or the civil liberties union, civil rights union, to elevate him. and i'm saying, what a response? what a response. the truth is, columbus was a slaver and a plunderer, among other things, and that should be mentioned while wrote you're waving the flag and beating the

drums here. the truth is there was an naacp and a civil rights critique then that could have elevated him. his name was bartela -- las casas. a spanish dominican. you read the stuff and it's powerful and moving about the murder and the slaughter and the retcheded horrors these explores were doing every time they game the new world. new world. it'sed a old as any other world on the planet. into the new world. and they always denounced the massacres and such. now, slavery -- that brings up the whole issue of slavery. we were taught, slavery was a way of life. a peculiar institution, they called it. a cute little name.

peculiar institution. don't judge it by modern standards. that's supposed to be, see, what bother bother yep was flashing at the question of the sip of presentism. you're imposing your present values values and such on this time, three centuries away. well, i'd like to say that these values that -- they're values that transcend time and place. i wrote a book called "the culture struggle" which deal with that. about how to think about culture, because culture is a field of struggle. it's constant struggle and constant flux in what we see as culture, and it's not presented that way in the anthropologyical and sociology books. these more raise, these languages, this, that, that boundary and these groups and these values. it's not -- that's not the way

it operates all the time. culture can -- it's true that culture permeates every aspect of life and every value and social system but it's not the sum total of life. it's not the sum total. you can have independent -- we have universal declaration of human rights. that is signed by 125, 130 different countries. all of which have different histories, different cultures, different notions about what is going on, different languages, and yet they all understand that there are things in that declaration that has to do with, what? with women having rights and protections. women having rights and protections. with all people having a fair share of -- on the value produced by labor and such.

so, how else do you think you can rate dante or gorta shakespeare. there's some things we're going to miss a little bit. that's why you have the scholars to put the little footnotes at the bottom. keeps them busy, makes them feel worthwhile. but meanwhile, we understand we are with our hearts what is go on, we understand with insight and power that transcend culture. so, when i hear about slavery, saying it was a way of life, i talk past my notes. then i can't find -- because i've gone over there where and my notes are down here.

don't -- when somebody says don't judge it by modern standards. know what i say? i say, oh, yes, judge by the highest and most current standards you can muster up because it stinks, it's rotten, and every slave society -- instance didn'tly niksch every slave society i've studied from ancient rome, which i wrote a book about -- i wrote a book about julius caesar but ahad chapter on slave in every slave society i came across a group of people in that society. no one ever reported this but i have seen a group of people in every one of those societies who denounced slavery, who opposed it, who understood its injustices injustices and its horrors who hated it. they were called slaves. and they never got their word in very well. there weren't many interviews, not too many of them

interviewed. well, that's what i would tell daniel borsten, how shallow his response was to that question. questioner. i've tried to teach that we should relate -- another thing, more general statement -- that we should relate immediate social experiences to larger social structures and to larger social relations. might begin to sound also to social science-y. if appearance was the sum total of reality we would need no investigation and no analysis and no social science. furthermore, furthermore, much of politics is the rationale universe irrational symbols. much of politics is filled with deception and hypocrisy.

when you hear good ideas and good questions raised and they're dismissed as conspiracy theory. you have a conspiracy theory? you know that you should always remember that a good conspiracy theory is not always a their rhythm there are real cop speier sis. there's secretedtive planning, constant deception. people come up to me and say, so you think there are people -- a group of people who get together in a room and they plot these things? i say, oh, no, not in a room. no. they go skydiving and hold their hands and say, what do we want to do about this and that? or they meet onls. and they plan that way. or build -- they make build a bird conference, bohemian grove in california, the knickerbocker club in new york. the council for foreign relations. they have think tanks and produce these things.

louis powell, a memo he sent to the chair or the education committee of the chamber of commerce. says this is what we have to do to roll back the social democracy developing intoers in and get back to the free market capitallallism. they open it. when you say they're didn't. don't they get things mixed up and make mistakes? they do sometimes. they do. everybody does. but they are pretty much -- you don't call them stupid and foolish. you don't call the people who own the world stupid and foolish. they're doing something right. my book, the face of imperialism, made that point and criticizing calmer johnson. he used to -- he's dead out in but used to talk about how foolish u.s. foreign policy is. how we get ourselves in

quagmires -- the favorite word -- how we get all mixed up and how we become overweaning and overdone. no. no. it's not overweaning. they know what they're doing. u.s. foreign policy -- the empire is not falling apart. it's doing very well. they're opening more bases than they ever had. they're destroying and killing more people. any leader, any movement, any country that shows any kind of independence, that tries to use the land, the labor, the capital, and the natural resources of a society, any leader who does that will be targeted, and he will be demonized and is demonized to the american people, noriega, putin, they well demonize him and tell the people this guy is an enemy of us, opposed to us. watch out for that. and once the people are convinced that this leader is a threat, then they will go along

with the -- they feel our country has license to bomb people or attack or invade. i would urge readers to give critical perception -- i'll stop right here -- give critical perception not only to what we think but to how we think. we should, as best we can, be inventively critical and not let conventionality keep us skidding along the surfaces. there's something i wanted to say about surfaces and about -- oh, i can't find it. what are you going to do? it was about -- well, it was about -- that you can never judge these things by surfaces. i was thinking of fascism, and german naziism. you can't judge them by -- there

was something else there that doesn't often get grabbed. you see it as sieg heil, goose-stepping, brutalizing religious minorities, military aggression, and that was fascism and we had to beat and it wasn't that a good war. what i try to show is that in fact there's a whole other thing. fascism was a very rational system. the essence of politics. the rational use of irrational symbols. the symbols are irrational. the tortures, guns, goose-stepping, swastika, incan additions and all -- incan additions and all that. all of that is -- are using irrational symbols for irrational reasons. what the fast cysts did in i

italy? they cut wages by 50 percent. nobody ever tells you that. you can read 100 bucks on who supported hitler but you never read anything about who hitler support after he got in and paid off. they abolished corporation taxes for big corporations. they gave huge sub days to corporations. they wiped out services. they got rid of protections for work and that sort of stuff. so that's what fascism is. it has a rational component which has to do with class. i'm going to stop there. because once i get into these subjects i get carried away a little. i know. but we should, as best we can, be inventively critical and not let conventionality keep us, as i say, skidding along the surfaces.

... and keep writing those books because the world needs you, michael parenti and what you have to say. speaking truth to power and the only way you do it.

how many of us are still waiting for a credible 9/11 investigation report? probably the cows will be coming home before that of her help in this. i would like to bring up here a wonderful poet, friend, tennessee read. she is the author of five books of poetry. can you imagine not her tender age a memoir and a novel. she has red all around the continental u.s.a., alaska, hawaii come and, hawaii, england, netherlands, germany, israel and japan. i believe she is going to be accompanied by her father, ishmael reid. drafting you. yes, ishmael reid and tennessee read. [applause]

♪ >> how high the moon. did you see the pink strawberry superman in june? worthy or september harvest moon rising over the open hills on the fatherless night. but about the august move that looks blue? emeritus 4.5 billion-year-old debris after impact between earth and mars. the apollo 11 landed there in 1968. i wonder what their view of the earth looked like 238,900 miles or one light year away. it's pressed bottle and pour changing colors each month. from earth i can see its burberry a winter place.

in some of its 300,000 craters when i zoom in with my nikon cool pix t. 510, there is a face on the present mood in october. it was looking down at me by hilton hotel, berkeley marina before the fog rolled in. maybe sean g, the chinese immortal moon goddess who swallowed the pill of immortality. her has been put up another of the west to be in the mortality punishment kirstein had 5:00 a.m. per for killing his nine sons. rose up into the heavens until she landed on the man. the full hunters known of october by the greek goddesses to main goddess of the moon and the goddess of the hunt of mount bob wells. they have resurrected after it

had sunk into the sea. in december the moon goddess of the ocean, motherhood and children rises during task over the pine trees at the strawberry canyon fire trails in the hills above you see berkeley before she reaches her fullest point, venus sets to the west end jupiter rises to the east. a few days later, he mañana and a fired down, turquoise orange and black. in brazil, people dressed in white and flocked to the copacabana beach in rio de janeiro and offer her jewelry, perfume, columns, lipstick, flowers and your spirit on the second of january, showing up against the purple dusk i as it begins to wane on january 23rd

of makes this opera house circle in the morning sky. the february snow moon is my favorite. i sense that it rises gleaming white and pink in the darkness of peaks to the black cloud. it shines in gold by the time my birthday comes around, it has completely waned. as daylight savings time arrives in march, the mood lingers over downtown berkeley and 4:15 in the afternoon, signaling the end of winter is here and the crows live make their last craws of the season. when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's amore. i'll take them to anyway it presents itself to me, whether it be the old devil moon, the shine on harvest moon, the moon over miami, the blue moon for many minutes ago.

but would we do without you. ♪ [applause] >> how many of you knew that ishmael could play like that? was it a surprise to some of you? well, he has been added and waiting for his next book to come out with a convenient cd. 12 bar blues for slaves. it'll be great. and not to see cher, the fantastic jazz pianist composer

librettist mary watkins. you can hear a little of that i think. okay, here we go. home base. homebase brings to the forefront of myriad of folks that inhabit the pop-up -- not, the streets of chicago for the unaltered roads of mississippi, arkansas, georgia and others inhabited through blacks throughout the south. stealing plant has lived with these folks, sharecroppers, preachers, misplaced mississippi blues men and women. he's been in their house, has dined at their table and i have struck at the bars on the corners. he is not a stranger to the articulation, voice is the call to him from a cemetery from the outskirts of southern mississippi delta town or settle on maxwell street in chicago. all through the observant and often on the present plans of

willie kent plump is always mindful of the slow, steady rhythms of the blues. not as a backdrop, but as the foundation and framework on which he structures the components of this book. with the publication of homebase , plump has once again captured the very essence of language and the blues from the inside out with great pleasure i present to you stuart plum. [applause] >> congratulations.

>> i can assure you that i will not jump from the stage. it is indeed a great honor to receive this award. most importantly because it is written about blues, but those of you who do not know, there is no indigenous african american music that was not suppressed by educated african-americans. spirituals probably would not exist had it not been for the

jubilee singers of the 1880s that went around the world. one african-american back here in the states heard that there had been well received in london or paris. of course, isn't it wonderful? to jazz because of the origins of the day didn't want their sons and daughters playing the music they began to write about jazz. of course this is a wonderful, great music. it is jazz. the father of gospel music in an interview that appeared in negro

digest said he would play to stand on corners to sell sheet music. he would go to churches and ask the minister for five minutes to try to sell sheet music and its 2015 and they have not called in the fbi. he says that they found the gospel convention and once these ministers saw how many people were tracked to the music at the music came immediately into the church. now, lose because of the vernacular is important to me because i was the first one in my family.

they said i've got book learning. i don't note the difference. what happens inside move from agrarian to this cd, got enough literacy to qualify for a scholarship in college. but there is a disjunct between the way i see my brothers and sisters. you don't know how to understand it. they tell you you're educated that you don't know how to understand it. when i came to this city in 1961 i was fortunate enough to see muddy watters almost every weekend. in this book is written by admin oren in 1936. the name was willie kent. at a time i was a professor at

the university of illinois. i don't want to go into that. but what happens to you at a big university, they've got all kinds of categories. i don't know. she could be a professor at the university in america. that's ridiculous. these things are made out. but i love it because willie kent was a musician and i followed him 18 years. i'm in the right time -- i don't want to say that you construct language. i am proud to accept the award because i don't want to meet my premature death because my

daughter, harriet and my wonderfully disciplined grandson, duncan. [applause] they came. and i came to accept the word for one reason. there were people that might say twain is my opinion and i don't vote on any award. ishmael reid has done as much to elevate the ceiling of american letters as anybody in this country. [applause] and i know him through cruncher were mumbo-jumbo.

broke down, freelance, a long, long history of the an individual and not being to anyone's win. i will read the poem. but who speaks. i was very close. i followed them in 1960. i talk about every night now. this particular blues being in 1936. i followed him and about 25 years ago, a crew from france did a film and the french --

1000 times more sophisticated than americans when it comes to conscience because they wanted to do to them than they thought i was writing the poem and immediately someone translated. you know, i would read and then someone would read it in french. and at that point, i gave willie kent the book and said willey, this is the book that i did about you. he said i didn't know you were writing about me. i told him that all he needed to know is that he was singing the blues and singing the blues while. now, i am not a reporter and i never crossed the line of saying anything in print about his

life. if i disagreed with his life, i would tell him. i just tell him to the face. so i actually -- i actually wrote it. most people don't know what i personifies. how do you write the poem down? very interested for young african-americans because you know you listen to hip-hop. do you know what i'm trying to say? e-mail, i., for the most important to musicians with dizzy gillespie and parker. and believe me when i tell you there is no buddy that brings america that produced that close

to being in the class. i'm talking about musically. you know it costs a cool all of that, the way these people were ripping the music back, today with african-americans, you have lyrics without music. you know, i am trying to understand it. you can't convey that because i actually believe every generation has the right to speak for itself. i mean, i actually believe that. i could in a lot of trouble sometimes with americans because they're telling me about barack obama. what do you think about him? what are you talking about? the president, they want me to comment on him as a potential

leader. you know, i try to be polite and i broke down and tell them i feel the same way about barack obama that i would feel about someone she wishes they became president. i don't confuse them with moses. do you get my drift? [laughter] do you catch my drift? in a statement, one of my former students became a brilliant blues musician. his name is billy branch. for a while he traveled all over the world with billy dixon. the interesting sideline and order for him to play the harmonica well, he told them not

to play. so i want you to watch this man, a man by the name of care for itself. you watch him and then you play. you know, he became very brilliant on the harmonica. but what he did, and he made it possible for me to go into all the blues clubs in chicago without paying. i don't know -- and the yuppie atmosphere, they will only charge you a dollar a drink. so you're not only go without paying, but they were only charging me a dollar drink and that is how i wrote the book. i actually took notes. at a certain point, i decided to write 1936 and he died maybe

march the second, 2006. and i will just read one short poem. it's called my name. i memorized doers shut in my face, getting five is my multiplication table. i garble my losses. here where i provoke outgrows from silences i hurt my daddy surrender. i'll might talk a song. all my conversations a song. i owned this discourse. inside my eyes, a miniature

burial ground i survey. two white horses. blood as highways. this is my father's story. this is my grandfather's story icing. i lease out gaps between my stories. a guitar player wants to play? there. a preacher wants to grow servants there. i inhale and exhale. this time and displays where my blues bleat finance news, spirits without credit. thank you.

[applause] >> you know, here in the united states, one is always hearing about freedom. it's almost compulsory that you talk about freedom that is, for he did not. free speech. it's a free country. it is not free. it is definitely not free. we all know that we have the largest percentage of

incarcerated people among our population in the world. it is not free. freedom certainly is a decision you make one day. i am going to be free now. do this now. it doesn't work that way. it takes precision. it takes discipline. and one rediscovers one's freedom through the product as a discipline and choice -- personal choice to revive and resuscitate once over freedom through discovering others and oneself. one of the most unique books to come along and a very, very long time, searching for zion, the quest for home and the african diaz for a case just such a book chronicling such a unique trajectory is spiritual

biography. and so, we are very deeply honored to present the american billboard two emmeline rabbit so for searching zion. [applause] >> thank you. i was born in oakland in 1976 pairs along with the honor of receiving the american book award, from the before columbus foundation, it has been a particular jury to return to the bay area. the place i know of as home when i was little girl. i moved to the east coast with my family when i was six, but i

feel especially grateful that my mother, to whom this book is dedicated accompanied me on this journey back to the west coast. and also here with me and my mom this afternoon are sent to your family friends who were our neighbors when we lived in oakland and they were the reason why oakland felt like home. i mention that because the feeling of calm is the son of jack of this book. i spent a decade of my 20s wandering across five nation to seek out black utopian communities of immigrants who had left home out of despair and even discussed and disenfranchisement. as second-class citizens, people who were themselves in search of a promised land elsewhere,

people inspired by the book of exodus and the israelites in the hebrew bible who left egypt to find the promised land. among the people that i talk to in those years where jamaica's roster for a and ethiopia, african american ex-pat, ethiopian jewish and israel and hurricane katrina transplants for my own family. my question for all of them was the same. have you found the home you are looking for? their answers were really complex and sometimes surprising. when i asked at the african hebrew israelite community, which has been squatting in israel's desert since the late 1960s, if you thought he arrived in zion, he said to me, emily, i was born into a detroit ghetto. if i wasn't here i would be

dead. when i talked to another man, thomas glaze, a jamaican american activist and author who fights for america sat something very smart, which i am going to share with you. i asked thomas was the lamb looks like in his imagination. time is a myth, emily, he said you i know i said feeling childish. but the search interests you, does not? yes, of course. as i am a click of a ticket totalview. freedom and total respect for everybody across class levels. not this democracy where people can't read and make choices about government. i am not just speaking on gay people issues. for justice for the poor and the island would really be paradise. that is what i envision. that sounds beautiful i said.

but then, emily, the search for blessedness has to start within. that is what a roster told me right before he said to kill the gay i said. so use a part of what he said that accords with your sent what is right he advised. you make your own gospel. that is all any of us can do. we have to ask ourselves, what am i doing to make sign-on possible? i am in jamaica would be one thing. but with the rest of the world tearing each other's throats, an island of zion is no sign on at all. thanks. [applause] >> never has a fictionalized window into the relationship between slave and master opened

onto such believable territory. wash unfolds like a dreamy impressionistic landscape, a luminous to book. is the atlanta journal-constitution. watch to achieve something extraordinary, a full-fledged confrontation with one of the most difficult aspects of our nations history. wrinkle has given us an honest and important expression of hope. a firm foothold that leads in the direction of truth and reconciliation. we would do well to take this step. the charleston post and choir. the great pleasure, margaret wrinkle. [applause]

>> good afternoon. thank you. i am so happy to be here am so honored. i want to thank the before columbus foundation for existing and thank ishmael reid for founding and for your awe-inspiring example. the board and panel for recognizing this incredible honor. it is deeply heartening to see wash and this company. i always think the ancestors are haunting me into unearthing their stories and weaving them together into one, especially wash. i am so pleased to thank genie to thank jeannie karajan and ally gray who were both here today for teaching me how to hold my own when working with the spirit world.

when people ask me how in the world did you come to write this strange and challenging book, and only say i feel the story has been headed for me all along. i was born in birmingham, alabama during the summer of 1963 after king's campaign and right before the bombing of 16th street baptist church that september. so i came into a very racially charged landscape and grew up in one. like a lot of white children in that area, many of my strong early bonds were with the black people being paid to take care of me. one person in particular was ms. ida mae loss in ida mae loss in washington you came to work for my parents when i was seven years old. she and mr. thomas jefferson goodwin who goes by tom with the aristocrats of my childhood. they saw me and they taught me how to see them. and he still segregated world, these profound relationships are not supposed to be fully

acknowledged. so i grew up rossing racial boundaries. divided loyalties. i found it confusing and surreal and i hated it. i was also struggling with the legacy of having slaveholder ancestors. a lot of white southerners for slaveholding ancestors tend to lionize them, demonize them or try to leave home and forget all about them. back then i didn't understand how untenable it is to have disconnected from your ancestors in your story, so i took the third option and tried to leave home as soon as i could. i was back when i thought our panel is the only place with any racial problems. so i lived as an exile for years and i was living in california, trying to act like i was in southern, trying to drop a phd program, both of which actually takes some doing. when mrs. washington surge valves have health problems that

she wasn't always a perk of my parents house tonight to visit. it started going to visit her and that is when everything changed. once we were on our turf, she was telling me more about her remarkable life and her remarkable family. i remember being so pleased about the way a relationship is going, but i was still young and i had a lot of time so when she died suddenly when i was living in california, it made me out and i realized they had out with my story. so i moved home. i bought a map and i proceeded to cross out the boundaries i've been schooled to respect. it's crazy i still get so nervous. i spent much of my time with ms. washington's family and they taught me how to hear them by the way they told me their stories many of which inspired this book. their incredible generosity allowed me to cross the color line and shed my weight and missing. after realizing that the children i was getting a phd

to teach or making it to college, started teaching in birmingham's inner-city birmingham's inner city using painting, drawing, photography and video to strengthen literacy and develop ways is to tell the stories i want to hear. this work eventually led me to make a documentary about contemporary race relations in birmingham called broken ground. the years i spent crossing back and forth between white and black communities, finding stories. on both sides of it is i'd excited to get the haunting feeling that our current racial man scraped and an external link back to slavery and to understand them i would have to trace them back to their roots. one of the many things that happened during slavery is the traditional indigenous reality was forced into a collision with modernizing western european descended reality, which is a long way of saying wait. i also knew that these two different worldviews came to create a new country, specially the american south. when i was starting to

understand this original coming together with contrasting worldviews was still reverberating, still unfolding, still happening even now. to sum up a much bigger picture very quickly, traditional west african philosophy and all indigenous thought is inherently spiritual and lives up in a more mystical nonlinear world view. is interconnected and animate. everything that ever happened to all the time and the eternal present moment is always accessible through ceremony and ritual. the modernizing west has become much more secular and linear, much more focus on chronological time. the past will stay in the past and we're supposed to keep everything in separate categories so they can see how misunderstandings would arise over the years, specially given the collision between these two world views happened within the crucible of slavery. when you look at the history three traditional west african

indigenous paradigm, the energy patterns laid down over hundreds of years of slavery are still with us. they are still shaping behavior, police, made the invasion. our capacity to see one another. too often what you see is what you expect to see. it's important to remember the entire institution of slavery depends upon the enslaved stranger and remaining one and sharing stories with one another across the racial divide breaks the dynamic down. this is precisely why sharing stories across the divide has been taboo for so long. in a documentary was a breakthrough because filmmaking allowed me to bring you the people speaking from very different perspectives and editing allowed me to bring voices together an equal footing and create a conversation between people who were not talking together, people not in the same room for the same part of town. documentary was well received and it did get people talking. i also learned people of a hard time being truthful about race

on camera. i knew i was going to have to move into writing to get a complexity of what he wanted to get out. by the time we were done, i was actually in despair of overwhelmed by the enormity of the stories that had never been told are heard across racial lines. just at the right time i heard a member of south africa's truth and reconciliation commission speak in birmingham. i was bowled over by what he was telling us how they were dealing with their history and the traditional concept we went to that we were all one and we all move together into healing or nine of us do. and south africa's people of different backgrounds speak in 11 different languages for gathering together and telling their very true. it was a far from perfect solution but i knew i had to witness it because i have started to feel we needed to have hearings in alabama in birmingham was known as the johannesburg at the south. i spent a month traveling around south africa, witnessing

different hearings in which all these voices from all these different experiences came together in one room on equal footing. without ever knowing i was preparing myself to write this book. as soon as i got home, i stumbled across a river that once labeled an ancestor may have been involved in the breeding of enslaved people. i was never able to find proof of the allegations are very much prefer the practice at all, but once i, but once i knew what it happened i felt it needed to be explored. slavery game has been how they debated. placket stories that have been spared white historians protest there is no proof. the ledger has been found like the one in which richardson blogs children. one of my family would ever donate such a ledger to the local archives. what slaveholder ever wrote down the whole truth of his surreal experience. finally i decided to ask myself about the ancestor in this rumor. but if he had? will the vaccine for everybody involved? i wrote to answer all the questions that came up.

i knew would be important to read about a slaveholder is if you're a relative. i started centering the story from the slaveholder richardson who was inspired by an ancestor of mine, but also by the other white men out on the tennessee frontier at that time trying to build empires would richardson of the revolutionary war veteran in the 70s are elected slaveholder with big guys because he tried jamaica's success out of memphis and one of my shin. i started centering because he's the one i thought i had the right to write about. i found a quote in an interview asked directly and he said yes, there was a guy named go. he got the extra bacon and he was sent were nine months later all these children were born. when i started thinking about the man as he's about to be sent away on that day, that's when the voice began to emerge and it was so clear and so psychologically sophisticated and i knew i had to find out

more about him and his life and weave his story together with richardson story and also the story palace is an enslaved healer on an enabling place. i have these three voices msn but they were all together somewhere. kind of an underground plays and they were all talking to me at all heard each other but they had heard anyone outside the shared reality and they would talk until they were heard and they would talk to me. it is every writer's dream, but in actual fact it was pretty overwhelming and they were so close in poznan nothing in my racing had prepared me for this experience. our member of the candles to say i was available and put them not to say i'm not available for today. i'm going to go out, see my friends, apgar mall. you are not going to be involved. so the whole experience was haunting and overwhelming and i knew i needed help from us went

to a west african teacher and healer. mala domain is from the tribe and his name is friend of the stranger a friend of the enemy. and it was in the west awareness ways that we could teach them to survive. ironically witty sadness teach the ways to the west so we can survive. he lives nearby and i went to him and he helped me. he took me into ceremony and taught me how to make and keep a traditional altar. he tied me about west african traditional spirituality and philosophy about the energetic architecture of a world where everything is connected and animate, everything happened here all the time accessible to ceremony and ritual. in this paradigm, this paradigm, ancestors of insight that no agency and a living have agency but not enough insight. so the living and the dead are designed to coexist in a reciprocal relationship, helping and supporting one another.

in this paradigm what was happening to me started to make sense. sure it was a second-generation descendent of slave holders with strong early bonds to those whose ancestors had been owned by mine. and so, somehow it became my job to be together these two different stories into one book, to put these different voices coming from different experiences on equal footing. washington richardson didn't always want to be in the same book. to each one of their own book. so that was a struggle because competing never stand too close to each other. growing up in a segregated place made me into a person always working to bring together what has been kept separate. so that is what i try to do. that might make it sound tidy, but it was a long and painful journey which turned into a blessing. the way is to get through it.

and some incredible guys. i listen closely to storytellers, mainly the people in washington family and their funerals and all the gatherings in between. they are master storytellers. but it took years before they stopped watching amounts around me. i should live to be 100 or about being a teenager during slavery, stepping up on the auction block to be sold in picking out a white man who seemed reasonable and flirting with him to get him to buy her. those of you who have read wachtel recognize they give that experience to the mother me now. i told from richard's point of view. i was also lucky enough to find a passage in a letter from another ancestor of mine, my grandfather's grandfather who was lionized for his bravery as a young man during the civil war serving and nathan bedford forrest calgary losing an arm

when he was 29. here he is writing 1905 to a man he served with. had all the soldiers in the confederate army fan like you would've had her independence but may be sure it is thought that we did not. after 40 years of peace, the south has prospered so much that we are worse as a whole. millions more than we had in 1861 and a curse, slavery you and i did not then understand but are now willing to acknowledge that it is no longer and we are united prosperous and happy people and we propose to go public full hearts and open arms in a few days the visit of the president of the united states and this too in face of the fact he gets 10 hours to a school and two to birmingham for metropolis of the south. weird how we have changed in how differently we look at things now for the way we looked at them 40 years ago. is it the hand of providence in fate or what the double is that? i think i will stop there.

there's a lot of people who held the life for me along all these years and i want to call their names, but i'm not going to do that. really i was compelled to write this book about our shared past in order to better understand our shared president. the story is just as much now about the early 1800s. my hope is that washington today to serve as a catalyst for an ongoing and essential conversation that more aggressive increase in the able and ready to have. thank you. [applause]

>> is jill here? good. i wasn't sure if you were. one of the collections of poetry on her this year for the columbus foundation is boyishly from tania olson. tonya couldn't be with us this afternoon and so it woo of her presence, jill tallent bilski has come to accept the word for

tania olson. [applause] >> hi, everyone. my name is jill. you were very close. i'm the managing editor at yes yes books. unfortunately time you had previous engagements in new york city, but she said she can't be here with us today. however, i have honor to be here accepting this award on her behalf and i am so grateful. i remember the joy of reading the proofs for this manuscript and i'm so excited others have loved the book of matches we have. so tonya sent along a few words. i will read those and i'll try to do justice to one of the poems from this wonderful

collection. to write poetry in this age can feel it continually shouting into an abyss. language is treated more as a toy or obfuscation than a tool for resistance and poetry becomes a punchline than a punch. a poet. what you really do. to read poetry at such a time became generosity to publish it an act of heroism and to recognize poetry to notice the work it the work i does than to acknowledge work is meaningful practically becomes an act of rebellion. that makes the work of the before columbus foundation does so critical for poets, writers, readers, for america. i think then today for that work, for saying that language of words and literature matter and i thank them for recognizing transports you noticed poetry by a 47-year-old first-time author on a small price is to say believed unusual and it makes a

real difference. i owe two yes yes books premiered by reading poems. it also produces their authors "boyishly" from the day came out is especially meaningful act out to have bounced back from the abyss. i'm going to read a poem called notes from jonas lecture series. so please forgive me for not doing as great of a job as i know tonya would have. notes from jonas lecture series. inside the whale, it is as if you have always been inside a whale, as if there was only inside the whale. it is as if there was before the whale and now you will always be inside a whale.

inside the whale you do not understand why you are inside a whale. it is even difficult to determine it is a whale. you may recall this cdma ship and going over the side, but the whale you never saw questioned the hardest angle for identifying the whale. answer, from inside the whale. from inside the well you cannot guide the whale. a whale will available to. you may throw your body to one side or another to steer the whale. the influence the capacity, but again a whale will do what a whale will do. when inside the whale, it is best to be inside the whale. do what you are inside to do. you may use only what was with you you should not try to

agitate the whale. it doesn't help if you check see too far from shore. unfortunately, you have forgotten about sure. when you find yourself inside the whale, meditate and practice journeys. no these are skills that must be recursive before needed. here is a pitch here is the pitching here is a pitch in his tenuous rumble, taste the acid of his gentle work you consider the see how brushing against skin and the way his wrath to reopen sooner attribute unremembered eyes. thank you. [applause] >> okay. how is everybody doing? good. acclaimed author alex espinoza

who is writing fresh magical beautiful and evocative returns with the captivating unforgettable novels that in hollywood's golden age as a gifted and determined young man leaves mexico and everything he has ever known to follow his dreams. growing up in a rural village at the height of the mexican revolution, many first singing and dancing and hearing stories of his ancestors. when tragedy strikes, young diego is sent to live with his aristocratic grandparents who insists he forget his roots in romantic take over the family business. under pressure to enter a profession and life which is haunted by the violence once again erupted all around him come to diego fleeces war-torn country to forge his own destiny. diego a rising hollywood in 1927 when silent films are given way to prohibitionist them, full

swing and not mother types are sought out even as they are looked down upon. but talent and ingenuity, diego soon figures out that getting one's face on the silver screen has as much to do with what goes on behind the camera as what goes on in front of it. but the closer diego comes to stardom, the more he signed the past is not set easily escaped as he is drawn again and again to the painful legacy of history and the wounds of his homeland, and a sweeping, sensual, novel of love, ambition and identity, the five acts buried all the marks of the classic hollywood story. romance, betrayal, glamour and an underdog hero to root for it until the end. not only an alec and startling

vision of a mexican in america, for claims, descendents of the new unique talent. alex espinoza. a chacon out and america certain to surpass the same of the novel silent hollywood hero. espinoza takes our literature from a mute lack of wide area to a national stage with full spectrum color and high-tech surroundsound. even as we mourn the loss of the innocents, alex espinoza spitted storytelling leads us to a hall of mirrors is fragmented and in multi-faceted as identity itself. alex espinoza. [applause] >> thank you so much. it is such an honor to be here with everyone.

mr. ishmael reid, i've been a big fan of yours for a long time and i am just humbled. my good friend, juan delgado. he came to my college years and years ago when i was a student at stanford in a college and he read a poem where he described the freeway overpasses as looking like a snake eating itself and i still remember that image. so i'm very honored to be here with all of you. a tough act to follow. you guys are on making me teary-eyed city mayor. i first would like to thank the before columbus foundation, justin desmangles for awarding my second novel the five acts of

an american book award. it is an honor to be recognized along such illustrious artists. the before columbus award foundation website states the american book awards are not bestowed by an industry organization but rather a writer's award given by other writers. for me, this scary special significance because we primarily do what we do in isolation, removed more or less from the literary world around us. this is ironic because what we are trying to do is enter into a conversation with other artists. sometimes they can feel like we are simply talking to ourselves or shouting at no one in particular while inside a very crowded room. this award reminds me that someone out there is listening and for that i am greatly humbled. i started with the idea to write a book about a fictional actor of color who constitute

hollywood from mexico in the nascent days of the talking pictures. what ended up happening was i ended up having to excavate a lot of the histories of my own family. while i was writing about diego's experiences at a fictional studio, my mother passed away and i suddenly realized that i was alone in the world, that i had no one connecting me to the past anymore and i had to become a chronicler of my own past experiences. i wanted to explore it more than anything the muddled history of two nations, the u.s. and mexico. two nations that are always an uneasy alliance. and through this book, the history of my own family emerged. my mother passed away and with her passing, she left the void and i became the keeper of those

stories. i am the youngest of 11 children whose face was always an issue in her three-bedroom house. as you can imagine, my home is very noisy. people coming or going at all hours. siblings, relatives, friends and brothers and sisters, friends of my brothers and sisters. in short, my home wasn't a sanctuary and i have no room of my own. my bedroom is the living room couch and most sites i fell asleep to the sound of either arguing with a television or sometimes both. there was a picture on the living room wall that i remember you're a vested house overlooking the courtyard with a fountain. some nights after everyone had gone to bat and i was able to enjoy the seller to dennis silent, i would stare at the picture lit up by streetlights outside and if i watch long enough, i could see the water moving. i can see the trees rustling in

the wind. i can imagine the lives led behind the windows of the house. i could envision goes and life and adventure in the forest just beyond the pictures borders. ..