These Truths

Americans are descended from slaves and slave owners, from conquerors and the conquered, from immigrants and from people who have fought to end immigration. "A nation born in contradiction will fight forever over the meaning of its history," Lepore writes. "Clear in purpose and elegant in design" (TLS), These Truths observes, "The past is an inheritance, a gift and a burden." "It can't be shirked. There's nothing for it but to get to know it.

Jill Lepore is the David Woods Kemper '41 Professor of American History at Harvard University, professor of law at Harvard Law School, and a staff writer at The New Yorker. Her many books include the New York Times bestsellers These Truths and We the People. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.