Michael Lewis, best-selling author of The Big Short and Boomerang, will speak to the Colgate community during Family Weekend, Nov. 1 at 6:30 p.m. in Memorial Chapel and online. His visit is part of the Kerschner Family Series Global Leaders at Colgate. Information on in-person tickets and livestream registration will be posted at colgate.edu/gls.
A sharp observer of politics, finance, and the evolution of American culture, Lewis combines insight and wit, making him one of today’s leading social commentators. Through his books and lectures, he takes a hard look at the ever-changing value systems that drive our economic markets, political landscapes, and cultural norms.
Lewis has published books on subjects ranging from politics to Wall Street. His newest, Going Infinite, tells the story of FTX’s collapse and the founder at its center, Sam Bankman-Fried. His previous book, The Premonition: A Pandemic Story, follows a biochemist, a public health worker, and a federal government employee as they confront the pandemic and find that the response from the United States government is woefully inadequate. All of them put “their careers on the line” as they tried to avert catastrophe, according to Lewis.
In October 2018, Lewis released The Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy, which examined a government in crisis. In December 2016, he released The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds, diving into the friendship between Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky and their study of decision-making and human errors in judgment. Flash Boys, released in March 2014, reveals how the legal — but highly questionable — practice of high-frequency trading allowed certain Wall Street players to work the stock market to their advantage. In The Blind Side, published in 2006, Lewis tells the story of NFL Offensive Tackle Michael Oher and how his life is transformed from being a teen living on the streets of Memphis after he is taken in by white evangelical Christians. Before that, Lewis wrote Moneyball, a book ostensibly about baseball but also about the way markets value people. Both of his books about sports became Oscar-nominated films.
Lewis’ other works include The New New Thing, about Silicon Valley during the Internet boom; Coach, about the transformative powers of his own high school baseball coach; Losers, about the 1996 presidential campaign; and Liar’s Poker, a Wall Street story based in part on his own experience working as a bond salesman for Salomon Brothers. He is also the creator and host of the podcast Against the Rules, a look at what’s happened to fairness in American life through the lens of people who depend on public trust.
Lewis holds a bachelor’s degree in art history from Princeton and a master’s degree in economics from the London School of Economics.
The Kerschner Family Series Global Leaders at Colgate, launched in 2007 and sponsored by Colgate’s Parents’ and Grandparents’ Fund, has brought to campus notable individuals whose work has had a global impact. Past speakers have included Nobel Peace Prize-winning journalist Maria Ressa, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, and President Joe Biden.