imp today. >> host: to recommend any books to your staff? >> guest: yes. sure. i tell them about the books. recom i recommend "roots" to everybody because it's such an essential part of the american story and the fact that it was such a learning experience for americans. i think it change the way we think about african-american life and our country change the way whiteha people. i told them about the death of caesar because i think that would be interesting tork anyone who worked in the senate. a book senator feinstein gave me >> host: what about fiction? what about not historical fiction such as "roots" but fun

stuff. >> host: my favorite piece of fiction is " all of the kings men ". i reread it last summer. i was astonished by how good it was. he was a gifted, gifted writer. he wrote that just after world war ii. it's a little racy for that time which is probably why it sold so well. but it is so intricately put together in the characters, you can still see who they are in the family difficulties and the pictures of life in louisiana. that is such a powerful book. another book which is not fiction that i have been reading for months is called the "seven pillars of wisdom". this is lawrence of arabia and

this is a book he wrote about his time in the desert back there in the world war i time. he did not take notes and then he lost the first draft or two and got earned up and he still wrote it. if you read the book it has all of this enormous detail about the sand dunes, what happened the day of this war in this movement, i don't how you can possibly remember all of it. at some of the most elegant writinggh that i have ever read. so i read at night to go to sleep. if i want to go to sleep i read a little bit of the seven pillars of wisdom. after a chapter i'm zonked. >> host: to have enough airplane time to request mark. >> guest: i don't read on the airplane too much. i go back and forth to tennessee, that is about one hour. so i usually am reading a or newspaper or were catching up on work, or sleeping.

i read when i'm by myself, at the night before i go to bed or sometimes early in the morning. in the summer i go fishing usually for a couple of weeks and i will take some books tohis read. >> host: mrs. alexander is also a reader. >> guest: big time. she loves to read. she -- we went to a discussion where and lives in nashville and she was talking about the best books which she had done for parade magazine. as she went through them i found my wife knew almost every one of them. i knew very few of them. >> host: senator lamar alexander, former former governor, former university president. we appreciate your time a book to be.

>> guest: thank you. >> here's a look at authors recently featured on book tvs, afterwards. our weekly author interview program. former attorney general. former attorney general alberto gonzales recalled his time serving in the justice department and is right house counsel in the george w. bush administration. georgetown university law professor, rosa brooks described the expanded role of the u.s. military around the world. ann coulter made her case of supporting donald trump or president. in the coming weeks on afterwards representative david bratt will discuss his time in congress and the economic challenges facing the country. face the nation moderator, john dickinson will remember important members and presidential campaigns. mary thompson jones will talk about her investigation of thousands of leaks state department cables. this weekend, new york times president and ceo, mark thompson discusses the way political speech has changed over time. >> attention spans feel so pressed for time today. the politicians are so anxious

to find formulations of language which work for twitter. they work for the the bottom of the screen of msnbc or c-span, a a few words that try to compress and compress. that means you get a lot of impact but maybe you lose some of the language gets lost. >> afterwards airs on book tv every saturday at 10:00 p.m. and sunday and 9:00 p.m. eastern. you you can watch all previous afterwards programs on our website, booktv.org. >> this is unprecedented level of visibility. there are always moments we said that in 1999 and he was speaking specifically to the idea of the explosion of his hip-hop in the global export of that and what does it mean for those particular images to like

not necessarily but to see these images to be projected to the world. how are we wrestling with the truth of the artist expression but also recognizing the truth is also born of a form of oppression and stereotyping and flattening of identities. how can we reconcile all of these things at once. that is very difficult thing to try to do. to respect one's truth and no that it's influenced by things that you may not want to be a part of. i think the attention of that hyper visibility and visibility is the essential american question because of the necessity that blackness is to the american identity.

an order for the united states to operate the way that it does it needs a bottom. like it's a system of hierarchy. in the capitalism is back. the needs and exploitation of class. and blackness provide, like white supremacy renders blackness that bottom class and it is consistent. always you have that bottom class and blackness is always there. and we create new racialized group to exploit them and demonize. we have latinos, muslims, and at different points ethnic groups are now considered whites aren't also considered part of that. i tell humans, irish and germans were all exploited classes of people but their escape was the fact that whiteness needed to

reproduce itself. to form strongholds political and economic strongholds to be embraced into that fold and to ensure that blackness is always at the bottom. so there is a need then to flatten those identities into demonize, to make them visible blackness, the humanity of black people. to the shows then all the different postcards that depict black men being lynched, eating watermelon in exaggerated features and just like calling us lazy but all of these different things are the work of ensuring that the humanity of black people remains visible. but but we also need to be seen in terms of like during slavery owning one of us was a status symbol and then having a speed

domestic and servants was a measure of one's worth in society. so there is always the attention of like the actual act of being seen, but also having your humanity denied and that's with the concept of visibility is getting at. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> here's a look at the list for this year's national book award for nonfiction. retired army colonel interbase of itch identifies the events he believes it led to increased presence in the middle east over the last few decades in " america's war, for the greater middle east and "the firebrand and the first lady", patricia bell scott recalls the friendship between polly murray and eleanor roosevelt. we provide a history of racism in america in "stamp, from the beginning" and adam : look that the movement from the early

20th century in "imbeciles". others include her report on the alienation felt by many on the protocol right in "and strangers in their own land". in the we weigh in on the vietnam war and the weapons of mass description argues that big data and computer models can be used to discriminate against people. a look at this years nonfiction finalist for the national book award continues with andre and a look at the enslavement of native americans and "the other slavery" american history professor, documents the haitian revolution on abolition in "the slaves cause".