Book TV

For you serious “bookie” types (reading not wagering), there is Book TV all weekend long (Saturday at 8 a.m. to Monday at 8a.m.) on C-SPAN2. The schedule this weekend:

Saturday, October 5 (All times Eastern)

8 a.m. Children’s Books. From Tillicum Middle School in Bellevue, Wash., Helen Szablya and Peggy King Anderson discuss their book, The Fall of the Red Star (Boyds Mills Press, 815 Church St., Honesdale, Pa. 18431). Told from the point of view of 14-year-old Stephen Kovary and based on the experiences of Szablya’s family, the book recounts the 1956 Hungarian revolt against the Soviets. The authors are joined by John Szablya, husband of Helen Szablya, who discusses the couple’s escape from Hungary. A question-and-answer period follows the presentation. (Re-airs at 12 p.m.)

7 p.m. Encore Booknotes. In this segment first aired in 1994, Professor Ari Hoogenboom joins host Brian Lamb in a discussion of his biography of the nineteeth president, Rutherford B. Hayes: Warrior and President (University of Kansas Press). Hoogenboom asserts that Hayes, who served as an antislavery lawyer, a general for the Union and Republican politician from Ohio, deserves greater recognition than he has previously received. Although he was largely blamed for the failure of Reconstruction, Hayes was a more progressive and
far-sighted leader than previously indicated and was a champion of equal rights and economic opportunity for blacks, the gold standard and civil-service reform, Hoogenboom maintains. October 5 is the 180th anniversary of Hayes’s birth. (Re-airs Sunday at 11 a.m.)

8 p.m. Public Lives. At the National Press Club, Tracy Wood, Tad Bartiumus and other contributors to War Torn: Stories of War from the Women Reporters Who Covered Vietnam (Random) share their thoughts on both Vietnam and what it was like to be female reporters in a war. There is a short question-and-answer session. (Re-airs Sunday at 10:30 p.m.)

11 p.m. History on Book TV. From Kepler’s Books and Magazines in Menlo Park, Calif., H.W. Brands talks about his book The Age of Gold: The Californian Gold Rush and the New American Dream (Doubleday), which tells how such figures as John and Jessie Fremont, Leland Stanford and George Hearst amassed their fortunes and emphasizes that the Gold Rush made many Americans replace a belief in the Puritan work ethic with a desire for instant wealth. Brands answers questions from the audience following his remarks. (Re-airs Sunday at 8 p.m.)

Sunday, October 6

12 p.m. Featured Program. The In-Depth guest is Edmund Morris, the Pulitzer Prize- and American Book Award-winning author of The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt (1979) and Theodore Rex (2001), both of which will be released in paperback by The Modern Library on Tuesday, October 8. He is currently working on the third volume of his trilogy about Roosevelt. Morris is also author of Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan (1999), the criticized mix of fiction and fact for which Reagan gave him unusual access. Viewers may call and send e-mails to the show. (Re-airs Sat 5 p.m. and Monday at 12 a.m.)