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A special conversation with author Jonathan Eig for his new biography King: A Life.
Join the Library and Politics and Prose bookstore for a special conversation with Jonathan Eig, author of King: A Life. In conversation with Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, Eig will discuss his new biography of Martin Luther King Jr., the first major biography of the iconic civil rights leader in over a decade.
Following the discussion, copies of the book will be available for sale and signature. A limited number of copies will be given away for free courtesy of the DC Public Library Foundation.
About the book:
Vividly written and exhaustively researched, Jonathan Eig's King: A Life is the first major biography in decades of the civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.--and the first to include recently declassified FBI files. In this revelatory new portrait of the preacher and activist who shook the world, the bestselling biographer gives us an intimate view of the courageous and often emotionally troubled human being who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself. He casts fresh light on the King family's origins as well as MLK's complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists. King reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death. As he follows MLK from the classroom to the pulpit to the streets of Birmingham, Selma, and Memphis, Eig dramatically re-creates the journey of a man who recast American race relations and became our only modern-day founding father--as well as the nation's most mourned martyr. In this landmark biography, Eig gives us an MLK for our times: a deep thinker, a brilliant strategist, and a committed radical who led one of history's greatest movements, and whose demands for racial and economic justice remain as urgent today as they were in his lifetime.
About the Author:
Jonathan Eig is a former senior writer for The Wall Street Journal. He is the New York Times bestselling author of five books, including Ali: A Life, Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig, and Opening Day: The Story of Jackie Robinson's First Season. Ken Burns calls him "a master storyteller," and Eig's books have been listed among the best of the year by The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Sports Illustrated, and Slate. He lives in Chicago with his wife and children.
About Congresswoman Norton:
Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton has served as congresswoman for the District of Columbia since 1991, and is the Chair of the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit. She came to Congress as a national figure who was the first woman to chair the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, as well as a civil rights and feminist leader, tenured professor of law, and board member at three Fortune 500 companies. The Congresswoman is a third-generation Washingtonian, and her work for full congressional voting representation and for full democracy for the people of the District of Columbia continues her lifelong struggle for universal human and civil rights.
AGE GROUP: | Seniors | Adults |
EVENT TYPE: | Author Talk |
