October 7, 2003
Director of Media Relations
413/542-8417
AMHERST, Mass.-Political journalist Joe Klein will speak about "The American Presidency Since 9/11" on Monday, Oct. 20, at 7 p.m. in the Babbott Room in the Octagon at Amherst College. Klein's talk, sponsored by the Office of the President at Amherst College, is free and open to the public.
As "Anonymous," Klein wrote Primary Colors (1996), a best-selling novel inspired by the 1992 presidential race. Klein more recently wrote The Natural: Bill Clinton's Misunderstood Presidency (2002). After Klein's second political novel The Running Mate (2000), New York Times critic Michiko Kakutani wrote, "Klein' s novels look at the moral compromises made by politicians and the changes wrought by the growing influence of consultants and negative campaigning. [The] books underscore the author's reportorial familiarity with the daily bump and grind of politics and his more tentative command of imaginative fiction." His other nonfiction books are Payback: Five Marines After Vietnam (1984) and Woody Guthrie: A Life (1980).
Klein, who was previously a columnist for Newsweek, has written "In the Arena," a column about national and international affairs, for Time since January. He also served as Washington correspondent for The New Yorker, commentator for CBS News, political columnist for New York magazine, reporter for WGBH-TV Boston and news editor at The Real Paper. He was a contributing editor for Rolling Stone and served as its Washington bureau chief. He has written articles and book reviews for The New Republic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Life, and other publications. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations and former Guggenheim fellow, Klein graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in American civilization.
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