June 12, 2025 • 18 mins
This recap episode unpacks a fascinating discussion between Joe Rogan and acclaimed documentarian Ken Burns, primarily exploring Burns' unique approach to filmmaking and his deep engagement with American history. Burns elaborates on his commitment to PBS for the creative freedom and extensive time it allows for his in-depth historical projects, contrasting this with the commercial pressures of other platforms. He stresses the importance of historical complexity and nuance, particularly in his upcoming American Revolution documentary, and highlights how his films aim to provide an immersive, educational, and humanising perspective on the past, moving beyond simplistic narratives. The conversation also touches upon the enduring relevance of history in understanding contemporary society, the value of diverse viewpoints, and the dedication required to produce such meticulously researched and impactful work.
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(00:00):
Welcome to the Joe Rogan recap. And before we get going, you can
now access the full Google Notebook with a mind map,
timeline and briefing document by clicking the link in the
descripcion. All right, today we are diving
deep into some really incrediblesource material.
It gives us this rare look inside the the process and
philosophy of Ken Burns. You know, the documentarian.
(00:22):
Yeah. One of the most impactful
storytellers out there. Totally.
We've pulled key insights from arecent, really fascinating
conversation he had. It explores just how he manages
to bring complex history so vividly to life for, well, for
millions. That's right.
And the source material, it's not just about what history he
covers, though that's part of it, obviously.
It really digs into the immense dedication the the years of
(00:46):
painstaking research and the truly unique perspective you
need to create work like that, work that actually shapes how we
understand our past. So we'll use his current
project, the American Revolution, as kind of a main
example. Exactly.
That's the big focus right now. But we'll also touch on lessons
he's found across. I mean his huge body of work,
Civil War, Vietnam, jazz, baseball.
(01:07):
Right, the list goes on. It does.
It's about understanding his whole approach, his guiding
philosophy, and ultimately why he thinks engaging with our
history, you know, with all its messy, complicated parts, is
just absolutely essential for usright now.
OK, so our mission then, in thisdeep dive is to really unpack
those core insights, like what drives someone to spend, what, a
(01:29):
decade or more on a single historical event?
Yeah, it's incredible. And what are the secrets maybe
to making those facts, those dates, really spring to life and
connects with people? And maybe most importantly, why
is grappling with those difficult, sometimes
contradictory truths? Why is that so vital for you
listening today? Great questions.
(01:50):
Let's start with the foundation.Maybe his unique path, that
choice he made to stick with PBSPublic Broadcasting for over 40
years. Yeah, that's amazing loyalty in
today's world. It is, and the reason he says is
actually quite simple. But it has huge implications.
Good time. He talks about time being the
absolutely crucial element PBS gives him the time he needs to
(02:10):
marinate the ideas, as he puts it.
Marinate the ideas I like. That, yeah.
And to do a truly deep dive intothe scholarship and importantly,
to triangulate the various scholarships, meaning look at it
from all different angles, different academic viewpoints.
So he's not just skimming the surface, he's really
synthesizing everything. Exactly.
And that commitment to time, well, it comes with a pretty big
(02:32):
trade off. He talks about consciously
deciding to live and work in isolation.
Tiny village, New Hampshire. Right.
I read that same house, same bedroom for like 46 years.
Yeah. I mean, think about that.
It was a deliberate choice not to go the Hollywood or LA route.
He actually calls it taking a vow of anonymity and poverty
initially. A vow of anonymity and poverty.
(02:54):
Wow, that's the opposite of whatyou'd expect from a successful
filmmaker. It really is, but for him, that
was the price he paid for full autonomy.
OK, Control. Complete control.
He talks about trading, you know, maybe hundreds or
thousands of viewers in dark movie theaters for reaching
millions of viewers on a smallerscreen through PBS.
(03:14):
And it's what, 330 stations across the whole country?
So it's about reach, but maybe adifferent kind of reach, more
public service. Definitely reaching communities
everywhere, not just the big cities, rural areas to provide,
getting local news, kids shows and then yeah, prime time
history. It really shows how mission
driven his work is, doesn't it? And the sheer range of topics is
just staggering. Civil War, Vietnam, Country
(03:38):
music, Jazz, baseball, National parks, the Buffalo.
Leonardo da Vinci, even. Right.
Each one is this massive undertaking, years and years of
work. And he says at the heart of
every single film, no matter thetopic, there's one fundamental
question driving it all. Which is.
Who are we? He sees looking at the past not
(03:59):
just as history for history's sake, but as a way to understand
where we are now, and maybe evenwhere we're heading.
History, for him, is simply the best teacher.
OK, so how does he take all thatdeep scholarship all that time
and make it, well, watchable, engaging for millions?
He talks about creating an entertainment pathway to
education using storytelling, obviously careful editing,
(04:20):
powerful music, sometimes even recreations, but done
thoughtfully. So it's not DRY like a textbook.
Exactly. The goal is to make learning
fascinating, even exciting. He contrasts it with what do you
call stale, boring classrooms. Yeah, I think many of us can
relate to that memory. And that storytelling relies
heavily on using the actual voices and images of the people
(04:42):
who lived through it. He really stresses how vital
that is. Like hearing directly from them.
Yeah, he gives the example of a Vietnam veteran talking about
going to war. You see it in their face, you
hear it in their voice. The weight, the emotion.
It connects in a way that just reading words on a page it just.
Can't. And finding those voices, those
images, those letters, that mustbe where the real heavy lifting
(05:06):
comes in. Absolutely.
That's the labor. And he keeps coming back to the
time commitment. 5.5 years for the Civil War. 10.5 years for
Vietnam. 10 1/2. Years and the American
Revolution. He started that back in December
2015. Obama was still president.
So over 10 years on that one. It's not something you can just,
you know, churn out. Definitely not.
OK, let's talk about the American Revolution then.
(05:26):
That's his current project, he says.
It's uncovering some surprising stuff.
Yeah, really challenging. The common understanding we tend
to have this, I don't know, thisclean, almost sanitized image.
Right. Powdered wigs.
Thoughtful debates in Philadelphia.
Founding Fathers TM. Right.
But he says the reality was incredibly bloody.
(05:47):
As bloody per capita as our Civil War.
Wow. As bloody as the Civil War per
capita. That's what he says, and that in
many ways it really was a civil war.
Neighbors fighting neighbors literally having to kill her
best friend on a hill. That completely shatters that
neat narrative. It does, but at the same time he
also frames it as this moment ofhuge global importance, a point
(06:10):
where something completely brandnew was being tried, what Thomas
Paine called an asylum for mankind.
An asylum for mankind? Yeah, that's powerful.
And he makes a deliberate effortto look beyond just the famous
names. Right.
Washington. Jefferson.
Adams, absolutely. They're there, of course, but he
works really hard to include thevoices of ordinary people.
Young soldiers, 1415 years old, a 10 year old refugee girl,
(06:33):
Women involved in resistance, Black individuals both enslaved
and free, Native Americans caught in the middle, even the
hired soldiers. Germans.
Irish. Scottish, Welsh.
Finding those stories must be incredibly difficult.
For sure, he points out. Historically, maybe only 1% of
people ever had a portrait painted, so real history means
(06:54):
finding the other 99%. And looking for those voices,
does that change how we see specific events it?
Can. Yeah, He talks about the Boston
Tea Party. The usual story is they dress as
Native Americans just as a disguise, right?
Or maybe to blame them. I've heard that too.
Right. But he brings in this
perspective from Phil de Laurie.The idea is that it was actually
(07:15):
a powerful symbolic act. They were saying essentially we
are no longer British, we are ofthis land, we are aboriginal to
this place now declaring a new American identity, separating
completely from the mother country.
That's that's a really differenttake.
I hadn't thought of it like. That Me neither.
And then there's just the incredible power of words during
the Revolution. Thomas Paine's Common Sense How
(07:37):
quickly that pamphlet shifted public opinion towards
independence. Yeah, amazing impact.
And the Declaration of Independence itself.
He mentions that famous edit by Benjamin Franklin.
Jefferson had originally writtenthat truths were sacred and
undeniable, right? And Franklin suggested changing
it to self-evident. Which sounds stronger somehow?
(07:58):
Or maybe. Different.
Well, Burns argues it was a really bold move.
It shifted the basis of rights away from something granted by
God or tradition towards something just obvious,
undeniable through reason. Even though, as he points out,
in a world full of hierarchy andslavery, these truths were
anything but self-evident at thetime.
(08:18):
That's a great point. They were aspirational, maybe.
Very much so. And he notes something
interesting about the phrase Allmen are created equal.
He suggests it's very vagueness,maybe unintentional, actually
became powerful later on. How so?
It opened the door for future generations, women, the poor
people of color, to grab onto that phrase and demand that the
nation actually live up to it. It's set the standard, this
(08:40):
ideal that the been wrestling with ever since.
So after declaring independence,how did they actually, you know,
build a government? The source material touches on
that too, right? They borrowed ideas.
Oh yeah, heavily from the British system, the
constitutional monarchy idea, but without the king.
From Enlightenment thinkers. Locke, Montesquieu.
Natural rights. From classical history ideas
(09:03):
about virtue temperance. And they learned from the stakes
too, right? Their own initial attempts.
Definitely. The colonial governments hadn't
been super effective and then the Articles of Confederation
were just too weak. They saw what didn't work.
So the Constitutional conventionin 87 was like, OK, let's fix
this. Exactly.
It was this intense effort to stop authoritarianism, to build
in safeguards that whole complexsystem of checks and balances,
(09:28):
legislative, executive, judicial, and then adding the
Bill of Rights later to nail down those fundamental freedoms.
It was messy, full of arguments,but driven by this real need to
create something durable. All this complexity seems really
central to his whole approach. You mentioned he has a sign.
Yeah, apparently a neon sign in his editing room.
(09:48):
Lowercase cursive. It just says it's complicated.
I love that. A constant reminder.
Exactly. A reminder to resist easy
answers, black and white thinking.
He warns against what he calls unforgiving revisionism.
Meaning like judging people in the past purely by today's
standards. Yeah, without trying to
understand their context, he uses figures like Washington and
(10:11):
Jefferson as examples. Founders of the nation,
brilliant thinkers, but also slaveholders who knew slavery
was wrong, right? That's the core contradiction.
And his point is, if you just dismiss them entirely because of
those flaws, you lose the chanceto understand who they actually
were, their complexities, the compromises they made, why they
were still crucial figures despite those terrible
(10:32):
contradictions. Good history, he believes, has
to embrace that contradiction and undertow.
Because people are complicated. History is complicated.
Exactly. It's all messy.
OK, maybe you can pull back a bit.
Look at some themes he sees recurring across different
historical periods. Patterns.
Yeah, he often brings up AbrahamLincoln's Lyceum address, where
Lincoln warned that the real danger to America wouldn't come
(10:55):
from outside, but from within. Byrne sees that as a theme that
just keeps popping up. That feels relevant.
And think about his Vietnam series.
It uncovered this devastating pattern of lying, basically
multiple presidents, multiple administrations not being honest
about the war's reality. And he highlights this
incredible miss opportunity backin 1956 after the Geneva Accords
(11:19):
if they just allowed the plannedelections.
Oh, Qi Min probably would have. Won.
Very likely, and maybe decades of war, millions of lives lost,
could have been avoided. It's staggering.
He even points out Ho Chi Minh quoted Thomas Jefferson in
Vietnam's 1945 Declaration of Independence.
No way really. Yeah, and Ho initially had a
good relationship with the OSS, the CI as precursor, but then
(11:40):
Cold War paranoia just took overand framed him as the enemy.
That connection is mind blowing and rarely talked about.
And Burns sees a parallel there,a missed opportunity with the
period after 911, there was thisglobal wave of sympathy, a
chance for maybe a different path.
Yeah, I Remember, Remember that.Feeling.
But instead, the US got drawn into long conflicts, echoing
(12:02):
some of those past patterns, maybe not fully learning the
lessons from Vietnam. It really makes you think about
that Mark Twain quote he uses. History doesn't repeat, but it
rhymes. Exactly because, he argues,
human nature doesn't change, he sees these echoes everywhere,
like the US trying and failing to invade Canada during the
Revolution, or King George the Third worrying about a domino
(12:25):
effect. The circumstances change, but
the human impulses, the fears, the ambitions, they rhyme.
That's a useful lens. He also uses sports sometimes,
right, to explore these bigger ideas.
Yeah, figures like Jack Johnson the boxer and Muhammad Ali, he
sees them as these complex figures who totally defied easy
(12:46):
labels and challenge the status quo.
Also with Johnson. WEB Dubois called Johnson's very
existence his unforgivable blackness.
Just by being successful, confident, and unapologetically
black in a deeply racist America.
He was a threat, right? And Muhammad Ali, Burns argues,
basically define the Vietnam erafor many people, sacrificing the
(13:08):
peak years of his career by refusing the draft.
No Vietnamese ever called me theN word.
That iconic line? Their stories aren't just about
sports. They're about race, identity,
courage, standing up to power. They show how sports figures can
really reflect and even shape their times.
OK, let's shift a bit to his more personal philosophy, his
process that isolation in New Hampshire.
(13:29):
It's more than just avoiding LA.Yeah, he talks about it
providing splendid isolation, but also a vital connection to
nature. He sees that as deeply American,
linking it to people like Walt Whitman.
So grounding himself, getting perspective.
Exactly. He feels it helps restore
perspective and what he sees as our disconnected, often anxious
modern world. He makes this point that society
has become too transactional. Transactional meaning just
(13:52):
focused on exchanges deals. Yeah, like everything is just
about what you get out of it. And he argues that people are
actually yearning for transformation, something
deeper. And that's what art and history,
done well, can offer. Transformation, not just
transaction. Right.
And underpinning all of this is a core belief, he repeats.
There's only us. There's only us, yeah.
(14:13):
Meaning there's no them. His goal isn't to preach to the
choir or divide people. It's to tell the true, honest,
complicated voices of American history to everybody.
So embracing the controversy, the tragedy.
Yes, all of it, while still highlighting what he calls an
abiding faith in the human spirit and in the potential of
the American Republic, flaws in all, to strive for progress.
(14:37):
And how does he think he earns the audience's attention for
these long, complex stories? By treating viewers as equals,
respecting their intelligence, presenting the complexity
without dumbing it down, he believes good history is
fundamentally just human beings telling resonant stories about
other human beings. Simple but profound.
And he has this fantastic analogy for the whole process
(14:58):
making Maple syrup. Maple syrup, OK.
He says it takes 40 gallons of raw SAP to make just one gallon
of finished syrup. Wow, that's a lot of boiling
down. Exactly, that's his view of
documentary making. You take hundreds of hours of
film, maybe 12,000 images, maps,letters, interviews, this vast
ocean of material, and through years of work you reduce it,
(15:21):
distill it down to the essentialstory for the revolution.
That's 12 hours boiled down froma decade of research.
It's this massive reductive process, it really.
Puts the effort into perspective.
And that kind of craftsmanship, he says, requires real humility.
He compares it to a woodworker who wouldn't try to hide a
mistake. It's constant refinement,
dedication to getting it right, even tiny details no one else
(15:43):
might notice. So humility in the face of the
material. Yeah, he talks about the daily
humiliations of what I didn't know, always learning.
And it also takes courage, what he calls 4 point zeros in the
morning courage. 4.0 in the morning Courage.
That phrase again, it really sticks, captures that deep
dedication, the lonely hours, maybe the doubts.
(16:04):
Absolutely. And Speaking of doubt, he
stresses how important it is to avoid certainty.
He says certainty destroys the mystery of the unknown.
So doubt is actually good productive.
Central, he thinks, crucial to keep questioning assumptions, to
see things from many sides, manyviewpoints.
And finally, just reflecting on the path itself.
(16:25):
Yeah, who mentions Robert Penn Warren?
Yeah, Warrens idea that careerism is deaf.
Meaning just chasing success or titles.
Right. Burns believes the key is
finding what you genuinely love,letting that passion evolve.
Really knowing yourself and justpersevering, sticking with it
through the hard times, living for the work itself, not just
(16:45):
for what other people think. Wow.
OK, so we've really covered a lot of ground here, digging into
these sources, his whole unique path, choosing PBS, the
isolation. Right, the focus on time.
Then how he makes history compelling that entertainment
pathway using real voices. And the deep dive into the
revolution, the complexity, the bloodiness, reinterpreting
moments like the Tea Party, the power of words.
And the recurring themes historyrhyming the lessons from
(17:08):
Vietnam, Lincoln, the. Sports figures as reflections of
society. And then finishing with his
personal philosophy, the nature connection, There's only us, the
Maple syrup analogy, humility, doubt.
Yeah, it's clear his work is about so much more than just
dates and facts. It's this deep engagement with
humanity over time, decades of dedication aimed at showing why
(17:33):
understanding our complicated past is just crucial for
figuring out the present. Seeing the nuances, the
contradiction. Exactly the universal stuff that
connects us all reflected in history.
And he leaves us with that thought from Lincoln, which
feels incredibly relevant right now, Lincoln said.
We cannot escape history. Right.
But he also said the dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to
(17:54):
the stormy present. As our case is new, so we must
think anew. So it's that tension, isn't it?
We're shaped by the past. We have to learn from it.
But we also can't be trapped by it.
We need new thinking for new challenges.
So maybe the final thought for you listening is this.
Reflecting on this deep dive on all the messy, complicated,
contradictory history we've touched on, the founders
(18:15):
brilliance and flaws, the ongoing struggles, those
patterns that keep rhyming. How do you use that complex
understanding of the past, the good, the bad, the ugly to
navigate the new challenges we face today?
How does thinking about the sacrifices, the compromises, the
deep complexities of history inform how you approach the
present and maybe even the future?
Welcome to the Joe Rogan recap. And before we get going, you can
now access the full Google Notebook with a mind map,
timeline and briefing document by clicking the link in the
descripcion. All right, today we are diving
deep into some really incrediblesource material.
It gives us this rare look inside the the process and
philosophy of Ken Burns. You know, the documentarian.
(00:22):
Yeah. One of the most impactful
storytellers out there. Totally.
We've pulled key insights from arecent, really fascinating
conversation he had. It explores just how he manages
to bring complex history so vividly to life for, well, for
millions. That's right.
And the source material, it's not just about what history he
covers, though that's part of it, obviously.
It really digs into the immense dedication the the years of
(00:46):
painstaking research and the truly unique perspective you
need to create work like that, work that actually shapes how we
understand our past. So we'll use his current
project, the American Revolution, as kind of a main
example. Exactly.
That's the big focus right now. But we'll also touch on lessons
he's found across. I mean his huge body of work,
Civil War, Vietnam, jazz, baseball.
(01:07):
Right, the list goes on. It does.
It's about understanding his whole approach, his guiding
philosophy, and ultimately why he thinks engaging with our
history, you know, with all its messy, complicated parts, is
just absolutely essential for usright now.
OK, so our mission then, in thisdeep dive is to really unpack
those core insights, like what drives someone to spend, what, a
(01:29):
decade or more on a single historical event?
Yeah, it's incredible. And what are the secrets maybe
to making those facts, those dates, really spring to life and
connects with people? And maybe most importantly, why
is grappling with those difficult, sometimes
contradictory truths? Why is that so vital for you
listening today? Great questions.
(01:50):
Let's start with the foundation.Maybe his unique path, that
choice he made to stick with PBSPublic Broadcasting for over 40
years. Yeah, that's amazing loyalty in
today's world. It is, and the reason he says is
actually quite simple. But it has huge implications.
Good time. He talks about time being the
absolutely crucial element PBS gives him the time he needs to
(02:10):
marinate the ideas, as he puts it.
Marinate the ideas I like. That, yeah.
And to do a truly deep dive intothe scholarship and importantly,
to triangulate the various scholarships, meaning look at it
from all different angles, different academic viewpoints.
So he's not just skimming the surface, he's really
synthesizing everything. Exactly.
And that commitment to time, well, it comes with a pretty big
(02:32):
trade off. He talks about consciously
deciding to live and work in isolation.
Tiny village, New Hampshire. Right.
I read that same house, same bedroom for like 46 years.
Yeah. I mean, think about that.
It was a deliberate choice not to go the Hollywood or LA route.
He actually calls it taking a vow of anonymity and poverty
initially. A vow of anonymity and poverty.
(02:54):
Wow, that's the opposite of whatyou'd expect from a successful
filmmaker. It really is, but for him, that
was the price he paid for full autonomy.
OK, Control. Complete control.
He talks about trading, you know, maybe hundreds or
thousands of viewers in dark movie theaters for reaching
millions of viewers on a smallerscreen through PBS.
(03:14):
And it's what, 330 stations across the whole country?
So it's about reach, but maybe adifferent kind of reach, more
public service. Definitely reaching communities
everywhere, not just the big cities, rural areas to provide,
getting local news, kids shows and then yeah, prime time
history. It really shows how mission
driven his work is, doesn't it? And the sheer range of topics is
just staggering. Civil War, Vietnam, Country
(03:38):
music, Jazz, baseball, National parks, the Buffalo.
Leonardo da Vinci, even. Right.
Each one is this massive undertaking, years and years of
work. And he says at the heart of
every single film, no matter thetopic, there's one fundamental
question driving it all. Which is.
Who are we? He sees looking at the past not
(03:59):
just as history for history's sake, but as a way to understand
where we are now, and maybe evenwhere we're heading.
History, for him, is simply the best teacher.
OK, so how does he take all thatdeep scholarship all that time
and make it, well, watchable, engaging for millions?
He talks about creating an entertainment pathway to
education using storytelling, obviously careful editing,
(04:20):
powerful music, sometimes even recreations, but done
thoughtfully. So it's not DRY like a textbook.
Exactly. The goal is to make learning
fascinating, even exciting. He contrasts it with what do you
call stale, boring classrooms. Yeah, I think many of us can
relate to that memory. And that storytelling relies
heavily on using the actual voices and images of the people
(04:42):
who lived through it. He really stresses how vital
that is. Like hearing directly from them.
Yeah, he gives the example of a Vietnam veteran talking about
going to war. You see it in their face, you
hear it in their voice. The weight, the emotion.
It connects in a way that just reading words on a page it just.
Can't. And finding those voices, those
images, those letters, that mustbe where the real heavy lifting
(05:06):
comes in. Absolutely.
That's the labor. And he keeps coming back to the
time commitment. 5.5 years for the Civil War. 10.5 years for
Vietnam. 10 1/2. Years and the American
Revolution. He started that back in December
2015. Obama was still president.
So over 10 years on that one. It's not something you can just,
you know, churn out. Definitely not.
OK, let's talk about the American Revolution then.
(05:26):
That's his current project, he says.
It's uncovering some surprising stuff.
Yeah, really challenging. The common understanding we tend
to have this, I don't know, thisclean, almost sanitized image.
Right. Powdered wigs.
Thoughtful debates in Philadelphia.
Founding Fathers TM. Right.
But he says the reality was incredibly bloody.
(05:47):
As bloody per capita as our Civil War.
Wow. As bloody as the Civil War per
capita. That's what he says, and that in
many ways it really was a civil war.
Neighbors fighting neighbors literally having to kill her
best friend on a hill. That completely shatters that
neat narrative. It does, but at the same time he
also frames it as this moment ofhuge global importance, a point
(06:10):
where something completely brandnew was being tried, what Thomas
Paine called an asylum for mankind.
An asylum for mankind? Yeah, that's powerful.
And he makes a deliberate effortto look beyond just the famous
names. Right.
Washington. Jefferson.
Adams, absolutely. They're there, of course, but he
works really hard to include thevoices of ordinary people.
Young soldiers, 1415 years old, a 10 year old refugee girl,
(06:33):
Women involved in resistance, Black individuals both enslaved
and free, Native Americans caught in the middle, even the
hired soldiers. Germans.
Irish. Scottish, Welsh.
Finding those stories must be incredibly difficult.
For sure, he points out. Historically, maybe only 1% of
people ever had a portrait painted, so real history means
(06:54):
finding the other 99%. And looking for those voices,
does that change how we see specific events it?
Can. Yeah, He talks about the Boston
Tea Party. The usual story is they dress as
Native Americans just as a disguise, right?
Or maybe to blame them. I've heard that too.
Right. But he brings in this
perspective from Phil de Laurie.The idea is that it was actually
(07:15):
a powerful symbolic act. They were saying essentially we
are no longer British, we are ofthis land, we are aboriginal to
this place now declaring a new American identity, separating
completely from the mother country.
That's that's a really differenttake.
I hadn't thought of it like. That Me neither.
And then there's just the incredible power of words during
the Revolution. Thomas Paine's Common Sense How
(07:37):
quickly that pamphlet shifted public opinion towards
independence. Yeah, amazing impact.
And the Declaration of Independence itself.
He mentions that famous edit by Benjamin Franklin.
Jefferson had originally writtenthat truths were sacred and
undeniable, right? And Franklin suggested changing
it to self-evident. Which sounds stronger somehow?
(07:58):
Or maybe. Different.
Well, Burns argues it was a really bold move.
It shifted the basis of rights away from something granted by
God or tradition towards something just obvious,
undeniable through reason. Even though, as he points out,
in a world full of hierarchy andslavery, these truths were
anything but self-evident at thetime.
(08:18):
That's a great point. They were aspirational, maybe.
Very much so. And he notes something
interesting about the phrase Allmen are created equal.
He suggests it's very vagueness,maybe unintentional, actually
became powerful later on. How so?
It opened the door for future generations, women, the poor
people of color, to grab onto that phrase and demand that the
nation actually live up to it. It's set the standard, this
(08:40):
ideal that the been wrestling with ever since.
So after declaring independence,how did they actually, you know,
build a government? The source material touches on
that too, right? They borrowed ideas.
Oh yeah, heavily from the British system, the
constitutional monarchy idea, but without the king.
From Enlightenment thinkers. Locke, Montesquieu.
Natural rights. From classical history ideas
(09:03):
about virtue temperance. And they learned from the stakes
too, right? Their own initial attempts.
Definitely. The colonial governments hadn't
been super effective and then the Articles of Confederation
were just too weak. They saw what didn't work.
So the Constitutional conventionin 87 was like, OK, let's fix
this. Exactly.
It was this intense effort to stop authoritarianism, to build
in safeguards that whole complexsystem of checks and balances,
(09:28):
legislative, executive, judicial, and then adding the
Bill of Rights later to nail down those fundamental freedoms.
It was messy, full of arguments,but driven by this real need to
create something durable. All this complexity seems really
central to his whole approach. You mentioned he has a sign.
Yeah, apparently a neon sign in his editing room.
(09:48):
Lowercase cursive. It just says it's complicated.
I love that. A constant reminder.
Exactly. A reminder to resist easy
answers, black and white thinking.
He warns against what he calls unforgiving revisionism.
Meaning like judging people in the past purely by today's
standards. Yeah, without trying to
understand their context, he uses figures like Washington and
(10:11):
Jefferson as examples. Founders of the nation,
brilliant thinkers, but also slaveholders who knew slavery
was wrong, right? That's the core contradiction.
And his point is, if you just dismiss them entirely because of
those flaws, you lose the chanceto understand who they actually
were, their complexities, the compromises they made, why they
were still crucial figures despite those terrible
(10:32):
contradictions. Good history, he believes, has
to embrace that contradiction and undertow.
Because people are complicated. History is complicated.
Exactly. It's all messy.
OK, maybe you can pull back a bit.
Look at some themes he sees recurring across different
historical periods. Patterns.
Yeah, he often brings up AbrahamLincoln's Lyceum address, where
Lincoln warned that the real danger to America wouldn't come
(10:55):
from outside, but from within. Byrne sees that as a theme that
just keeps popping up. That feels relevant.
And think about his Vietnam series.
It uncovered this devastating pattern of lying, basically
multiple presidents, multiple administrations not being honest
about the war's reality. And he highlights this
incredible miss opportunity backin 1956 after the Geneva Accords
(11:19):
if they just allowed the plannedelections.
Oh, Qi Min probably would have. Won.
Very likely, and maybe decades of war, millions of lives lost,
could have been avoided. It's staggering.
He even points out Ho Chi Minh quoted Thomas Jefferson in
Vietnam's 1945 Declaration of Independence.
No way really. Yeah, and Ho initially had a
good relationship with the OSS, the CI as precursor, but then
(11:40):
Cold War paranoia just took overand framed him as the enemy.
That connection is mind blowing and rarely talked about.
And Burns sees a parallel there,a missed opportunity with the
period after 911, there was thisglobal wave of sympathy, a
chance for maybe a different path.
Yeah, I Remember, Remember that.Feeling.
But instead, the US got drawn into long conflicts, echoing
(12:02):
some of those past patterns, maybe not fully learning the
lessons from Vietnam. It really makes you think about
that Mark Twain quote he uses. History doesn't repeat, but it
rhymes. Exactly because, he argues,
human nature doesn't change, he sees these echoes everywhere,
like the US trying and failing to invade Canada during the
Revolution, or King George the Third worrying about a domino
(12:25):
effect. The circumstances change, but
the human impulses, the fears, the ambitions, they rhyme.
That's a useful lens. He also uses sports sometimes,
right, to explore these bigger ideas.
Yeah, figures like Jack Johnson the boxer and Muhammad Ali, he
sees them as these complex figures who totally defied easy
(12:46):
labels and challenge the status quo.
Also with Johnson. WEB Dubois called Johnson's very
existence his unforgivable blackness.
Just by being successful, confident, and unapologetically
black in a deeply racist America.
He was a threat, right? And Muhammad Ali, Burns argues,
basically define the Vietnam erafor many people, sacrificing the
(13:08):
peak years of his career by refusing the draft.
No Vietnamese ever called me theN word.
That iconic line? Their stories aren't just about
sports. They're about race, identity,
courage, standing up to power. They show how sports figures can
really reflect and even shape their times.
OK, let's shift a bit to his more personal philosophy, his
process that isolation in New Hampshire.
(13:29):
It's more than just avoiding LA.Yeah, he talks about it
providing splendid isolation, but also a vital connection to
nature. He sees that as deeply American,
linking it to people like Walt Whitman.
So grounding himself, getting perspective.
Exactly. He feels it helps restore
perspective and what he sees as our disconnected, often anxious
modern world. He makes this point that society
has become too transactional. Transactional meaning just
(13:52):
focused on exchanges deals. Yeah, like everything is just
about what you get out of it. And he argues that people are
actually yearning for transformation, something
deeper. And that's what art and history,
done well, can offer. Transformation, not just
transaction. Right.
And underpinning all of this is a core belief, he repeats.
There's only us. There's only us, yeah.
(14:13):
Meaning there's no them. His goal isn't to preach to the
choir or divide people. It's to tell the true, honest,
complicated voices of American history to everybody.
So embracing the controversy, the tragedy.
Yes, all of it, while still highlighting what he calls an
abiding faith in the human spirit and in the potential of
the American Republic, flaws in all, to strive for progress.
(14:37):
And how does he think he earns the audience's attention for
these long, complex stories? By treating viewers as equals,
respecting their intelligence, presenting the complexity
without dumbing it down, he believes good history is
fundamentally just human beings telling resonant stories about
other human beings. Simple but profound.
And he has this fantastic analogy for the whole process
(14:58):
making Maple syrup. Maple syrup, OK.
He says it takes 40 gallons of raw SAP to make just one gallon
of finished syrup. Wow, that's a lot of boiling
down. Exactly, that's his view of
documentary making. You take hundreds of hours of
film, maybe 12,000 images, maps,letters, interviews, this vast
ocean of material, and through years of work you reduce it,
(15:21):
distill it down to the essentialstory for the revolution.
That's 12 hours boiled down froma decade of research.
It's this massive reductive process, it really.
Puts the effort into perspective.
And that kind of craftsmanship, he says, requires real humility.
He compares it to a woodworker who wouldn't try to hide a
mistake. It's constant refinement,
dedication to getting it right, even tiny details no one else
(15:43):
might notice. So humility in the face of the
material. Yeah, he talks about the daily
humiliations of what I didn't know, always learning.
And it also takes courage, what he calls 4 point zeros in the
morning courage. 4.0 in the morning Courage.
That phrase again, it really sticks, captures that deep
dedication, the lonely hours, maybe the doubts.
(16:04):
Absolutely. And Speaking of doubt, he
stresses how important it is to avoid certainty.
He says certainty destroys the mystery of the unknown.
So doubt is actually good productive.
Central, he thinks, crucial to keep questioning assumptions, to
see things from many sides, manyviewpoints.
And finally, just reflecting on the path itself.
(16:25):
Yeah, who mentions Robert Penn Warren?
Yeah, Warrens idea that careerism is deaf.
Meaning just chasing success or titles.
Right. Burns believes the key is
finding what you genuinely love,letting that passion evolve.
Really knowing yourself and justpersevering, sticking with it
through the hard times, living for the work itself, not just
(16:45):
for what other people think. Wow.
OK, so we've really covered a lot of ground here, digging into
these sources, his whole unique path, choosing PBS, the
isolation. Right, the focus on time.
Then how he makes history compelling that entertainment
pathway using real voices. And the deep dive into the
revolution, the complexity, the bloodiness, reinterpreting
moments like the Tea Party, the power of words.
And the recurring themes historyrhyming the lessons from
(17:08):
Vietnam, Lincoln, the. Sports figures as reflections of
society. And then finishing with his
personal philosophy, the nature connection, There's only us, the
Maple syrup analogy, humility, doubt.
Yeah, it's clear his work is about so much more than just
dates and facts. It's this deep engagement with
humanity over time, decades of dedication aimed at showing why
(17:33):
understanding our complicated past is just crucial for
figuring out the present. Seeing the nuances, the
contradiction. Exactly the universal stuff that
connects us all reflected in history.
And he leaves us with that thought from Lincoln, which
feels incredibly relevant right now, Lincoln said.
We cannot escape history. Right.
But he also said the dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to
(17:54):
the stormy present. As our case is new, so we must
think anew. So it's that tension, isn't it?
We're shaped by the past. We have to learn from it.
But we also can't be trapped by it.
We need new thinking for new challenges.
So maybe the final thought for you listening is this.
Reflecting on this deep dive on all the messy, complicated,
contradictory history we've touched on, the founders
(18:15):
brilliance and flaws, the ongoing struggles, those
patterns that keep rhyming. How do you use that complex
understanding of the past, the good, the bad, the ugly to
navigate the new challenges we face today?
How does thinking about the sacrifices, the compromises, the
deep complexities of history inform how you approach the
present and maybe even the future?
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