David Greenberg’s new book John Lewis: A Life is the definitive biography of the civil rights leader, U.S. congressman, and national moral compass, who helped bring about a new birth of freedom in America. Thoroughly researched and dramatically told, Greenberg’s account follows Lewis from young Freedom Rider and speaker at the 1963 March on Washington, through his severe beating on “Bloody Sunday,” to his heading of the Voter Education Project, to becoming a Democratic leader in the House, where he was known as the “conscience of the Congress.” Greenberg, a professor of history and journalism at Rutgers University, who is also the author of Republic of Spin and Nixon’s Shadow, speaks with Rachel L. Swarns, a professor of journalism at NYU and longtime former contributor at The New York Times. Both are former fellows at the Leon Levy Center for Biography.
