In his latest book, The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, Pico Iyer gives us the first serious consideration of the Dalai Lama’s ideas and work as a politician, scientist, and philosopher. Iyer, one of the most acclaimed observers of Asia and Buddhism and a frequent contributor to Harper’s Magazine, Time, and The New York Review of Books, has been engaged in conversation with the Dalai Lama for the last three decades. The Open Road illuminates the hidden life and the daily challenges of a global icon.

Recorded Wednesday, April 16, 2008 at Chicago Public Library.