Ron Chernow: Mark Twain, Whistler, and the Gilded Age

On June 17, 2026, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Ron Chernow joined Aimee Ng, Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator, for a conversation in the Stephen A. Schwarzman Auditorium. Together they discussed Chernow’s sweeping new biography, Mark Twain, his forthcoming study of James McNeill Whistler, and the rivalries, ambitions, and cultural transformations that shaped America in the Gilded Age.