King of Kings: An Evening with Scott Anderson

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE KIRKUS PRIZE • From the author of the landmark bestseller Lawrence in Arabia comes a stunningly revelatory narrative history of the Iranian Revolution, one of the most momentous events in modern times. This groundbreaking work exposes the jaw-dropping stupidity of the American government and traces the rise of religious nationalism, offering essential insights into today's global unrest.

On New Year’s Eve 1977, President Jimmy Carter toasted Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, extolling Iran as “an island of stability” due to “your leadership and to the respect and the admiration and love which your people give to you.” The shah, known as the King of Kings, seemed invulnerable, and he was invaluable to the United States as an ally in the Cold War. Twelve and a half months later, the shah fled Iran into exile, forced from the throne by a volcanic religious revolution led by a fiery cleric named Ayatollah Khomeini. How could the United States have been so blind?

Based on voluminous research and dozens of interviews, Scott Anderson weaves the spellbinding story of a dictator oblivious to the disdain of his subjects and a super­power blundering into disaster. The Iranian Revolution, Anderson convincingly argues, was as world-shattering an event as the French and Russian Revolutions. Around the globe, including in the United States, the hatred of economically marginalized, religiously fervent masses for a wealthy secular elite has led to violence and upheaval—and Iran was the tem­plate. King of Kings is a bravura work of history, and a warning.

6 pm reception/6:30 pm program
Free & open to the public. Registration required.

Copies of King of Kings will be available for sale & signing.

About Scott Anderson

Scott Anderson is the author of two novels and five works of nonfiction, including Lawrence of Arabia, an international bestseller which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and a New York Times Notable Book. He is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine. The Magazine devoted an entire issue in August 2016 to his reportage across the Middle East, which was published in book form as Fractured Lands: How the Arab World Came Apart.