One Book. One Author. One Hour.

Featured Exhibits

Booknotes & Science/Technology

Though it was originally conceptualized as a program about history and the political process, in its fifteen year run, “Booknotes”...

Booknotes & The Art of Writing

http://129.174.21.2/bknotes/plugins/Dropbox/files/529450.pdf

Brian Lamb was known for asking questions beyond the book’s subject matter. He was especially interested in the ins-and-outs of...

Booknotes & National Security Issues

http://129.174.21.2/bknotes/plugins/Dropbox/files/1204217.pdf

The “Booknotes” era was framed by both the cooling of the Cold War and the heating up of the War...

A Look at C-SPAN's "Booknotes" Television Series

It was a television institution. Airing every Sunday night at 8:00 PM during the years 1989 through 2004, C-SPAN’s "Booknotes" television program gave its viewers an insider’s look at a recent non-fiction book and its author. Brian Lamb, the network's CEO, was the program's host. His guests were historians, scientists, politicians, world leaders, and others who came to discuss their recent books with Lamb and his audience.

Guests on the program ranged from the relatively unknown to the largely famous. There were individuals who, although experts in their particular fields, might not have enjoyed universal name recognition. Some who appeared on "Booknotes" went on to produce additional works, which won them national acclaim. Still others were already household names, such as Hillary Clinton, David McCullough, Tom Brokaw, Mikhail Gorbochev, Clark Clifford, Sandra Day O’Connor, Betty Friedan, and David Crosby just to name a few, as well as former presidents Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton.

"Booknotes" was C-SPAN’s original author interview program. It focused on then-current non-fiction works in categories such as history, biography, politics, the military, diplomacy, and science. Booknotes gave authors an opportunity unmatched anywhere else in the television industry to talk at length about themselves and their books to an educated reading audience. Indeed, guests who appeared on the Booknotes program still recall the experience as a positive and beneficial one for the both the author and the reader.

The program stayed faithful to its promise of “one author, one book, one hour” every week for fifteen years. Each Sunday night Brian Lamb and a non-fiction writer would discuss the writer’s most recent work. But the discussion did not end there. Lamb asked the author about their research, their personal and family life, how and where they wrote, and who influenced them. It was an opportunity to go up close and personal with an author for both Lamb and his audience.

The George Mason University Libraries are currently preserving and archiving books, papers, and photographs pertaining to the "Booknotes" program.

This site provides access to selected items in the George Mason University Libraries’ collections pertaining to Booknotes and the C-SPAN Television Network.

For a complete inventory of the physical books in the collection, please see the records in the Libraries' catalog. To view the original Booknotes interviews in their entirety or browse transcripts of these interviews, visit the C-SPAN Booknotes site.

Featured Exhibits

Booknotes & Science/Technology

Booknotes & The Art of Writing

Booknotes & National Security Issues

Featured Items

Brian Lamb and a local television reporter.

The First World War.

Lincoln.

Shelby Foote holding a handwritten, bound manuscript.