The Book of Man

New York Times best-selling author William J. Bennett uses stories, essays, historical vignettes, and contemporary profiles to explore and explain what it means to be a man.

Fashioning men has never been easy, but today it seems particularly tough. Boys need heroes to embody the everlasting qualities of manhood: honor, duty, valor, and integrity. Without such role models, boys will naturally choose perpetual childhood over the rigors of becoming a man—as many women, teachers, coaches, employers, and adults in authority can quickly attest. Too many boys and men waste time in pointless and soulless activities, unmindful of their responsibilities, uncaring in their pursuits. Have we forgotten how to raise men, how to lead our boys into manhood?

In The Book of Man, Bennett charts a clearer course, offering a positive, encouraging, uplifting, realizable idea of manhood, redolent of history and human nature, and practical for contemporary life. Like his classic, The Book of Virtues, Bennett uses profiles, stories, letters, poems, and myths to bring his subject to life, defining what a man should be, how he should live, and to what he should aspire in several key areas of life. Chapters include:

Man in War
Man at Work
Man in Play, Competition, and Leisure
Man in the Polis
Man with Woman and Children
Man in Prayer and Reflection

MORE VIDEO COMMENTARY FROM WILLIAM J. BENNETT

1. What led you to write "The Book of Man"?

2. What does the Bible teach about being a good man?

3. Why such confusion in recent history?

4. Examples of undermined masculinity?

5. Best and worst male role models?

6. Impact of the feminist movement?

7. Why are masculine qualities worth defending?

8. What about critics who say "men are fine"?

9. What challenges do "real men" face today?

10. What challenges to "real men" face in politics?

11. Who were male role models in American history?

12. Are women also experiencing an identity crisis?

13. How do we reclaim ourselves and our men?