>> and you're watching booktv on c-span2. this was another part of the reading of elie wiesel's "night" which took place recently at the museum of jewish heritage in new york city. the conclusion of this program will air at 5 p.m. eastern time. >> booktv tapes hundreds of author programs throughout the country all year long. here's a look at some of the events we'll be covering this week. tuesday we'll be in alexandria, virginia, to hear susan gates, former vice president at freddie mac, talk about the collapse of the mortgage giant in 2008 and evaluate the chances of it happening again.

also that evening we'll be at busboys and poets bookstore in the nation's capital to cover a talk by yale law school professor james foreman. he'll be discussing his book "locking up our own: crime and punishment in black america." wednesday we head the new york where journalists amie parnes and jonathan allen will talking about hillary clinton's 2016 -- will talk about hillary clinton's 2016 campaignful we'll also be in dallas where tony smith will discuss his book, "why wilson matters." thursday we're in durham, north carolina, for a talk by benjamin waterhouse, history professor at the university of north carolina. his book, "the land of enterprise," charts the development of business in america. we'll also be at the smithsonian 's museum of natural history in washington, d.c. with a report on the impact that

humans are having on our planet. and on saturday and sunday, we'll be live from the los angeles times festival of books. featured authors include annie jacobson, hugh hewitt, adam hochschild and lisa lucas. that's a look at some of the events booktv will be covering this week. many of these events are open to the pluck. look for -- to the public. roar for them to air in the -- look for them to air in the near future on booktv on c-span 2. >> we were flying down with president obama on air force one, then-president obama, to selma, alabama. and i had asked him a question about, quote-unquote, postracial versus post-obama era. and he said i would not equate my election with seminal moments like the emancipation proclamation or the passage of the civil rights act, the voting rights act. those were mass you have changes

in legal status that represented fundamental breaks in america's tragic history and were the pillars, the 13th amendment, 14th amendment and 15th amendment of civil rights acts of the '60s. those were, those represented the dismantling of formal discrimination in this country. there's nothing that's going to compare to that. moving forward, our work is to build on that work, to fine tuna work where we see formal discrimination or state-sponsored discrimination still occurring. but increasingly, our work has to do with dealing with the ongoing legacy of a divided society. closing the opportunity gaps, closing the achievement gaps, closing the wealth gaps that inevitably has been passed on from generation to generation because the gaps were so wide. and that involves no one piece of legislation, but it requires a host of different efforts. it means investing in early childhood education. it means us making sure everybody has health insurance. it means that kind of public/private work that we're

doing through my brother's keeper. it means getting more african-americans in s.t.e.m. education, in math and science and engineering. and so there's not going to be one silver bullet, but, rather, it's going to be a sustained effort on a variety of fronts that will take us to the next leg of this journey towards a more just society. wow. that was on our way to selma, alabama, for the 50th anniversary of bloody sunday. and those words still ring true today. but, again, who are we? so this book really goes into the heart of the matter. when you talk about race -- and this is kind of piggybacking off what president obama said, then-president obama -- isn't it strange to say then-president obama? it's just been ten days. [laughter] or eleven days, i don't know, i can't even keep count now. but the bottom line is that we still have a society that is divided. and i'm going to think about, and i'm going to go back to

something, my children's favorite singer, leslie odom jr., and this song called "seriously." we are our united divided states. so when it comes to matters of race, african-americans still have the highest numbers of negatives in almost every category. and issues of policing are very important. that's one of the pieces where i start in this book. traditionally in the african-american community, the american black community, there is an instinctive coming of age truth for our young black men called the talk. it's something black fathers or father figures give their sons or equivalents. it's meant to be a lifetime tool that might help these boys strategically navigate interactions with law enforcement, with the ultimate goal of avoiding altercations. the talk can spell life or death for some black males. i know it sounds so 1950s and '60s, but now more than ever that's the reality in the modern age more than 60 years later. the essence of the talk is a dad

telling his son in blunt terms that some bad policing results in death for our black men and boys. be it intentional or unintentional, it is more than a soulful truth. it's an unavoidable fact in our communities. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> the pulitzer prizes were awarded on monday, and two of this year's winners have appeared on booktv. first up, the winner for fiction, coulson whitehead, who talks about the underground railroad. and then coming up in about an hour, heather ann thompson will recount the attica prison uprising of 1971, "blood in the water," winner of the pulitzer prize for history. >> welcome back. everybody. let's get started.get i'm leyla, i'm your room host for the day.