Julian Zelizer: Books Born from My Intellectual Passions

I teach and write about how American democracy works as well as its dysfunction.

We have a five-pound Maltese named Lyndon. He is the first dog that I ever owned so I didn’t realize the comedic element when I suggested naming him after President Lyndon Johnson (who I was writing a book about, The Fierce Urgency of Now) who was over 230 pounds.

The Purpose of Power by Alicia Garza. In the fall, I taught a graduate course at Princeton’s SPIA school about the history of civil rights leadership. We started in the early twentieth century and ended with Black Lives Matter. I am looking forward to reading about Garza’s insights into the use of power and how it compares with previous leaders in the movement.

Stephen King novels. From the very first book, I loved the page-turning suspense and craft of the genre.

A Promised Land by Barack Obama. I am very interested in learning how the former president narrates his own journey from emerging as a leader in 2004 who promised to overcome “red versus blue” American into someone grappling with a radicalized Republican Party.

Any beach is a perfect condition.

The Machiavellian Moment by J.G.A. Pocock; The Age of Reform by Richard Hofstadter; and Master of the Senate by Robert Caro.

Jews and Judaism in a Midwestern Community: Columbus, Ohio, 1840-1975 by Marc Lee Raphael. My late grandfather, Nathan Zelizer, was a Rabbi in Columbus, Ohio. I found this local history in our family collection which contains fascinating information about his work in this important midwestern city.

Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Insisted on Equality for All by Martha Jones.

I write constantly. Every day, I make certain to write a little bit after the research phase of a project has been completed. With the benefit of immense self-discipline, I am fortunate to be able to be productive in almost any environment—from the solitude of a library to a crowded subway. Importantly, I am the kind of writer that works through many drafts. Rather than attempting to get everything right the first time around, I enjoy working through multiple versions of manuscripts as I attempt to craft the narrative and argument.

Each new book topic usually grows out of previous research or articles. Throughout my career, I have only picked topics that grow out of my intellectual passions rather than professional calculations. While I have a relatively good feel for what would be an interesting book project, I like to run through many ideas with my wife and friends before deciding on what will stick. In addition, my agent and editors can be enormously helpful in sensing what would be viable. But the ultimate litmus test comes when I put paper to pen (so to speak) in drafting a formal book proposal.

Beloved by Toni Morrison. Signed copy from my college days at Brandeis University. She spoke and signed books after. I’ll never forget that.

The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel; God in Search of Man by Abraham Joshua Heschel; The Insecurity of Freedom by Abraham Joshua Heschel. I’ve just finished writing a biography of Heschel (Forthcoming, Yale University Press). I believe that his work showcases humanity and the aspirations to live a pious life more than almost anything else published.

Parting the Waters by Taylor Branch. Reading this book in college was pivotal to my gaining an interest in general non-fiction historical writing.

After writing several books about political polarization since the 1970s and the rightward turn of the Republican Party, I wanted to better understand how this happened. Rather than focusing on the sorts of macro explanations that are common in journalism and political science—the sorting of voters, gerrymandering, legislative rules, etc—I wanted to look at specific individuals and specific moments that moved us toward our current state of affairs.

I came to understand that Newt Gingrich’s rise to power in the 1980s was central to the transformation of the GOP with its embrace of smashmouth, no guardrails partisanship. Gingrich’s takedown of the Speaker of the House, Jim Wright, in 1989 was a pivotal moment because it was at that point that he moved from being a maverick and bomb-thrower to officially becoming part of the GOP leadership. The rest, as they say, was history. It is also a riveting story, a real-life House of Cards thriller which offered me to write about the history of partisanship in a way that could engage readers.

Nine Days: The Race to Save Martin Luther King Jr. and Win the 1960 Election by Paul Kendrick and Stephen Kendrick. I am starting research on a project about the civil rights movement in the 1960s and I’m interested in different narrative structures that are being used to explore this period in new ways.