Letter From Carla And Barbara

Politics & Prose Spring Storewide Member Sale
This coming weekend - all weekend long - nearly everything currently on our shelves is discounted for Politics & Prose members. Most books are 20% off, most CDs and DVDs are 15% off. If you are not yet a member, it's a great time to sign up and take advantage of our discount opportunities.

And if you can't make it into the store, the same discounts will also be applied to members' purchases online at www.politics-prose.com from Friday, March 19, 12:01 a.m. through Sunday, March 21, 11:59 p.m. 

No events are scheduled on Saturday and Sunday.

National Capital Area ACLU’s 2010 Bill of Rights Awards Dinner
Thursday March 18 is the big night when we receive the ACLU’s Edgerton Special Recognition Award for "demonstrating how the Freedoms of Speech and Press contribute to the public good."  In accepting this prestigious award, we will be recounting our early months, which set the course for 25 years devoted to presenting authors who fervently championed these First Amendment freedoms.  One of the first was Herblock, the intrepid political cartoonist from the Washington Post, whose book, Herblock Through the Looking Glass, had just been published.  In our first few years, we also hosted I.F (Izzy) Stone for his contrarian and controversial The Trial of Socrates; Anthony Lukas for Common Ground - his groundbreaking study of court-ordered busing to integrate the Boston public schools, and Marian Wright Edelman for Families in Peril.

During these 25 years, we have quite regularly seen Politics & Prose described both in print and online as a leftist bookstore.  What our critics don’t understand is that our commitment to freedom of speech dictates that we carry books across the entire political spectrum.  And the biggest surprise of all?  Karl Rove’s Courage and Consequence, displayed prominently since its arrival in the store last week, is now #8 on our bestseller list!

PASSOVER BEGINS
Passover begins March 29 this year. Click here to see and buy some of our selections of Haggadahs and related books.

TICKETS FOR SALE NOW

Wednesday, April 7, 8:15 p.m.
at the Avalon Theatre
5612 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.
(Metro: Friendship Heights)
DAVID REMNICK (in conversation with MICHELE NORRIS of N.P.R.)
THE BRIDGE: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama (Knopf, $29.95)
Using interviews and letters, David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, has expanded his magazine profile of Obama to tell the 44th president’s life story and trace the remarkable political journey that led to the White House. 

Click here for two free event tickets with purchase of the book or click here for a single $10 ticket each without book purchase.

Wednesday, April 14, 7 p.m.
at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
600 I Street, NW
(Metro: Gallery Place - Chinatown)
YANN MARTEL
BEATRICE AND VIRGIL (Spiegel & Grau, $24)
Martel won the 2002 Man Booker Prize for The Life of Pi, his story of a boy and a tiger adrift at sea. His new novel, featuring a donkey, a howler monkey, and an enigmatic taxidermist, is an equally whimsical and philosophical consideration of truth and deception, responsibility and complicity.

Click here for two free author event admission tickets with purchase of the $24 book from P&P or click here for a single $12 ticket without book purchase.

On Thursday March 18 at 10:00 a.m., famed bass-baritone Gerald Finley will sign his latest recital CDs. Most recently, Mr. Finley sang the role of Marcello in the Met’s La Bohème, and created the role of Robert Oppenheimer in John Adams’s Dr. Atomic.

• Schumann: Dichterliebe & Other Heine Settings (Hyperion)
• Ravel: Songs (Hyperion)
• Barber: Songs (Hyperion)
• A Song-For Anything: Songs By Charles Ives (Hyperion)
• SONGS: Tchaikovsky, Musorgsky and Ned Rorem (Wigmore Hall Live)

The pianist on each disc is Julius Drake.  If you cannot attend, call the store or click here to purchase signed CDs for in-store pickup or to be shipped to you.

National Capital Area ACLU’s 2010 Bill of Rights Awards Dinner

Photograph by Arlene Polangin 

Next week, on March 18, we will accept the Henry Edgerton Civil Liberties Special Recognition Award at the National Capital Area ACLU’s 2010 Bill of Rights Awards Dinner.

While making some brief remarks about how gratified we are, we will take the occasion to reflect on one of the many books that we have promoted over the years that frame a historical event crucial to the affirmation of the Constitution and civil rights.  This new book, SUPREME POWER: Franklin Roosevelt vs. the Supreme Court, by Jeff Shesol (Norton, $27.95) is a wonderful reminder about the precarious existence of civil rights, even during the administrations of presidents who seemed to embrace them. 

In this new book, Shesol tells a sad and intricate story about how President Roosevelt came to underhandedly attempt to manipulate the number of seats on the Court in an effort to defeat the conservative majority.  It was a shoddy and duplicitous maneuver.  Roosevelt went to great lengths to denigrate the court, tastelessly suggesting that the Gridiron Club was a more appropriate court of appeal.  Shosel assesses Roosevelt’s court-packing as the work of an arrogant and delusional president, the same president that we continue to revere because of his avowed dedication to civil rights.  Did that make him a bad president?  Not at all.  Like all great men, he had his own pockets of hypocrisy, and his surreptitious attempt to pack the Court with liberal justices painfully reminds us of the endless need to remain vigilant about our constitutional freedoms even in seemingly safe political environments.

PASSOVER BEGINS
Passover begins March 29 this year. Click here to see and buy some of our selections of Haggadahs and related books.

TICKETS NOW AVAILABLE

Wednesday, April 14, 7 p.m.
at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
600 I Street, NW
(Metro: Gallery Place - Chinatown)
YANN MARTEL
BEATRICE AND VIRGIL (Spiegel & Grau, $24)
Martel won the 2002 Man Booker Prize for The Life of Pi, his story of a boy and a tiger adrift at sea. His new novel, featuring a donkey, a howler monkey, and an enigmatic taxidermist, is an equally whimsical and philosophical consideration of truth and deception, responsibility and complicity.

Click here for two free admission tickets with the purchase of BEATRICE AND VIRGIL or click here to purchase a single $12 ticket without the book.

On Thursday, March 18th, the ACLU of the National Capital Area will be honoring us at their 47th Annual Bill of Rights Awards Dinner with their Henry Edgerton Civil Liberties Special Recognition Award "for uniquely demonstrating how the freedoms of speech and press contribute to the public good." We are flattered and appreciative of this distinctive recognition of Politics and Prose’s unique contribution to our city’s intellectual life.  Any customers who would like to attend the dinner or who would like more information, please click the link below.

We are also delighted to learn that our longtime friend and customer Jane Shore has been awarded this year's Poets' Prize, awarded annually for the best book of verse published by an American in the previous calendar year.  Her poetry collection, A YES-OR-NO ANSWER (Houghton Mifflin, $22), was singled out for the award, chosen by a jury of 20 American poets.  We have many copies in the store and will ask Jane to stop by and autograph them. Previous winners of the prize include Wendell Berry, Marilyn Hacker, Maxine Kumin, and Adrienne Rich.  Way to go, Jane! 

Some of the highlights of our upcoming week include:

Tonight, March 4, Robert Mnookin, who leads the Harvard Program on Negotiation, describes tension-filled situations from historical events, business, and international politics and sets out his instructions for effectively handling these adversarial situations. In negotiations, one often portrays the other party as an untrustworthy opponent, and sometimes they truly are. His book BARGAINING WITH THE DEVIL (Simon & Schuster, $27) will help clarify when this is appropriate, and when it is not, as he coaches the reader to pay attention to instincts, but also critically assess what both sides have to gain and lose from the relationship and how their unique interests are likely to motivate each party.

Tomorrow, March 5, we are pleased to host Chris Cleave whose book LITTLE BEE (Simon & Schuster, $14) was a store favorite in hardcover and is now available in paperback. It is told from the perspective of a young girl who has fled the violence in Nigeria hoping to find a better situation in England; Little Bee is put in a detainment facility while the authorities determine if she is truly a refugee. The story begins as she, seeking help in this incomprehensible country, tries to make contact with a British family whom she met during a traumatic circumstance. They discover that she is also uniquely suited to helping them. This book is a great selection for bookgroups.

Next Monday, March 8, Lorraine Adams (Harbor) brings her exciting roman à clef, THE ROOM AND THE CHAIR (Knopf, $25.95), home to Washington where it is set. D.C. insiders will recognize Thompson's Boat House and thinly disguised versions of well-known people. A story about the press corps converges with one about military espionage when an Air Force pilot inexplicably loses control of her aircraft.

Finally, in another thoughtful and tragically beautiful expression of the impact of trauma on human lives and relationships, Chang-rae Lee's THE SURRENDERED (Riverhead, $26.95) is exquisite. The novel mostly deals with the aftermath of the Korean War, but also takes place thirty years later, and in a prelude, during the Manchurian War. The principal characters - June Han, a young Korean girl; Hector Brennan, an American GI; and Sylvie Tanner, a missionary - have complex emotions and complicated motivations. They hide their pain and shift between the need for human interaction and isolation. Chang-rae Lee will visit the store next Thursday, March 11. Highly recommended.