our author is katie butler, author of knocking on heaven's door the path to a better death. her words have already reached many people. she had a long career as a journalist for the san francisco chronicle and work had also been published in such diverse outlets such as the new yorker, the best american science writing and i love this one, the best buddhist writing. there were 2010 essays what broke my father's heart what was published in "the new york times" magazine. there she described, and i remember the day that i read it including terms, the story of her aging parents and in particular the story of how, when and why they put a pacemaker in her father against some of the family's wishes. the piece it turns out was the fourth most email story in "the new york times" that your. that's how much attention and got and how many people needed to hear that story. knocking on heaven's door tells us more about it and katie's story, too, but painting a bigger picture indeed. it is part investigative journalism and asks us a basic question: hal modern medicine and its quest to avoi

katie butler presents her thoughts on end-of-life care and knocking on heavens door. the path to a better way of death. and bush and cheney in the white house, days of fire. they correspond the correspondent for "the new york times" recalls the working relationship between president bush and vice president dick cheney. jessamine ward recounts the depths of five men in her life in a memoir called men that we reaped. for extended links to other publications visit booktv's website at booktv.org. >> now on booktv, william seale examines washington dc's landscape between the spanish-american war and world war i. this is 40 minutes. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> thank you, emily. and good evening. it is a great pleasure to introduce william seale. i have known him for a very long time. because he married my good friend and college classmate. i married a brilliant historian, and so did she. william seale is a charming and witty texas gentleman. he has interest in history and he has built a long career in both. he's a native of beaumont, texas, he holds a ba from so

[applause] i am pleased to introduce to you today the author katie butler speaking about knocking on heaven's door. [applause] the >> and there is a complicated difficult conversation that as a culture we have not been happening with. but they also have an opportunity for being deeply spiritually satisfying and lessening the amount of suffering that people are going through in the last phase of their life now. >> some say they want to die at home, but actually a quarter of us do. most of the hospitals and nursing homes and they die in the intensive care units and this is about hearing a kind of death and i could imagine everyone inventing new because they either struck down or are drugged so they don't tear the tubes out that are binding them to this earth were. i think it's very important for me to make it clear that i'm not arguing for neglecting the people that we love in the last phase of their life. we have a medical system that is by yes towards with juror and caring. for example my dad had a major stroke at 79. a year later he was given a pacemaker, which he was kind of pressu