New Books in Biography
This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field.
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1526
Ronald L. Lewis and Robert L. Zangrando, "Walte...
Though overshadowed today by more celebrated figures, Walter Francis White was one of the most prominent campaigners for civil rights in mid-20th-century America...
79 min
1527
Robin Wallace, "Hearing Beethoven: A Story of M...
Music lovers and researchers alike have long been fascinated by the story of Ludwig van Beethoven who became profoundly deaf as an adult...
55 min
1528
Mark T. Calhoun, "General Lesley J. McNair: Uns...
In this pioneering study of one of the World War Two era US Army’s primary architects of victory, Calhoun presents a portrait of a deeply intellectual and loyal commander who took on responsibility for many unpopular doctrinal and ToE choices.
82 min
1529
Julian Jackson, "De Gaulle" (Harvard UP, 2018)
If Sir Winston Churchill was (in the words of Harold Macmillan) the "greatest Englishman In history", then Charles de Gaulle was without a doubt, the greatest Frenchman since Napoleon Bonaparte...
67 min
1530
David Dayen, "Fat Cat: The Steve Mnuchin Story"...
How did a Wall Street executive and “foreclosure king” like Steve Mnuchin become the Treasury Secretary for a populist like Donald Trump?
35 min
1531
Andrew R. Murphy, "William Penn: A Life" (Oxfor...
While William Penn’s name is one familiar to many Americans thanks to his founding of the Pennsylvania colony...
59 min
1532
Joe Jackson, "Black Elk: The Life of an America...
Black Elk witnessed some of the most monumental moments in the history of the Lakota and the Northern Great Plains....
68 min
1533
Nicholas Bauch, "Geography of Digestion: Biotec...
While most people in the US are familiar with the ubiquitous Kellogg cereal brand, few know how it relates to US geography, science and technology around the turn of the 20th century...
59 min
1534
Lindsey Fitzharris, "The Butchering Art: Joseph...
45 min
1535
Andrew S. Curran, "Diderot and the Art of Think...
Denis Diderot has long been regarded as one of the leading figures of the French Enlightenment...
62 min
1536
R. David Cox, "The Religious Life of Robert E. ...
Professor Cox’s book presents his perennially controversial subject was a consistently religious thinker, working from the deist and evangelical influences of Lee’s parents towards the religious convictions and commitments of his maturity...
40 min
1537
James R. Rush, "Hamka's Great Story: A Master W...
From Indonesia’s declaration of independence in 1945 up until today, the relationship between Indonesian nationalism, Islam, and modernity has been a key subject of debate...
42 min
1538
Patricia O'Toole, "The Moralist: Woodrow Wilson...
Whether you love him or hate him, it is indisputable that few, if any, other 20th-century American presidents were as historically consequential as Woodrow Wilson...
36 min
1539
Andrew Roberts, "Churchill: Walking With Destin...
For all of the books written about Winston Churchill, much remains to be said about his extensive life and career...
46 min
1540
McKenzie Wark, "General Intellects: Twenty-One ...
McKenzie Wark’s new book offers 21 focused studies of thinkers working in a wide range of fields who are worth your attention...
61 min
1541
Diarmaid MacCulloch, "Thomas Cromwell: A Revolu...
45 min
1542
Alec Nevala-Lee, "Astounding" (Dey Street Books...
41 min
1543
Peter Zinoman, “Vietnamese Colonial Republican:...
Over the course of the 1930s, Vietnamese author Vũ Trọng Phụng published eight novels, hundreds of works of narrative nonfiction, stories, plays, essays and articles. He was a best-selling writer in his own day who sharpened his acute literary talents,...
43 min
1544
Jonathon Earle, “Colonial Buganda and the End o...
In his book Colonial Buganda and the End of Empire: Political Thought and Historical Imagination in Africa (Cambridge University Press, 2017), Dr. Jonathon Earle illustrates the rich and diverse intellectual history of Buganda,
49 min
1545
Howard W. Rosenberg, “Ty Cobb Unleashed: The De...
Today we are joined by Howard W. Rosenberg, author of Ty Cobb Unleashed: The Definitive Counter-Biography of the Chastened Racist (Tile Books, 2018). In this deeply researched volume, Rosenberg achieves what many biographers have failed to do: to put C...
75 min
1546
Patrick Fuliang Shan, “Yuan Shikai: A Reapprais...
When he was elected president of China in 1912, Yuan Shikai was hailed as his nation’s George Washington, yet four years later he would die as the leader of a country in turmoil after a failed bid to become its emperor.
48 min
1547
Sue Prideaux, “I Am Dynamite!: A Life of Nietzs...
Like most philosophers, Friedrich Nietzsche is better known for his ideas than for the life he led. In I Am Dynamite!: A Life of Nietzsche (Tim Duggan Books, 2018), Sue Prideaux details the events of his life and shows how they can inform many of the c...
41 min
1548
Roland Philipps, “A Spy Named Orphan: the Enigm...
Donald Maclean was one of the most treacherous and productive – for Moscow spies of the Cold War era and a key member of the infamous “Cambridge Five” spy ring, yet the complete extent of this shy, intelligent,
58 min
1549
Kathryn Fuller-Seeley, “Jack Benny and the Gold...
Jack Benny was one of the first crossover stars in broadcast comedy, rising from the vaudeville circuit to star in radio, film, and television. Kathryn Fuller-Seeley chronicles Benny’s career in her book, Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio...
65 min
1550
David Pietrusza, “TR’s Last War: Theodore Roose...
Teddy Roosevelt had one of the most colorful lives in the American history, but few have deeply explored his final years. Historian David Pietrusza does just that in TR’s Last War: Theodore Roosevelt, the Great War,
56 min