You may have missed these recent biographies of iconic political figures - three Presidents and a legendary Senator. Each of the four books presents a fresh, intimate, and sometimes surprising view of its subject.
Colonel Roosevelt by Edmund Morris (Find in our catalog)
Summary: “Of all our great presidents, Theodore Roosevelt is the only one whose greatness increased out of office. When he toured Europe in 1910 as plain “Colonel Roosevelt,” he was hailed as the most famous man in the world. Crowned heads vied to put him up in their palaces. “If I see another king,” he joked, “I think I shall bite him.” Had TR won his historic “Bull Moose” campaign in 1912 (when he outpolled the sitting president, William Howard Taft), he might have averted World War I, so great was his international influence. Had he not died in 1919, at the early age of sixty, he would unquestionably have been reelected to a third term in the White House and completed the work he began in 1901 of establishing the United States as a model democracy, militarily strong and socially just. This biography by Edmund Morris, the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author of The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt and Theodore Rex, is itself the completion of a trilogy sure to stand as definitive. Packed with more adventure, variety, drama, humor, and tragedy than a big novel, yet documented down to the smallest fact, it recounts the last decade of perhaps the most amazing life in American history. What other president has written forty books, hunted lions, founded a third political party, survived an assassin’s bullet, and explored an unknown river longer than the Rhine? Colonel Roosevelt begins with a prologue recounting what TR called his “journey into the Pleistocene” – a yearlong safari through East Africa, collecting specimens for the Smithsonian. Some readers will be repulsed by TR’s bloodlust, which this book does not prettify, yet there can be no denying that the Colonel passionately loved and understood every living thing that came his way: The text is rich in quotations from his marvelous nature writing. Although TR intended to remain out of politics when he returned home in 1910, a fateful decision that spring drew him back into public life. By the end of the summer, in his famous “New Nationalism” speech, he was the guiding spirit of the Progressive movement, which inspired much of the social agenda of the future New Deal. (TR’s fifth cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt acknowledged that debt, adding that the Colonel “was the greatest man I ever knew.”) Then follows a detailed account of TR’s reluctant yet almost successful campaign for the White House in 1912. But unlike other biographers, Edmund Morris does not treat TR mainly as a politician. This volume gives as much consideration to TR’s literary achievements and epic expedition to Brazil in 1913-1914 as to his fatherhood of six astonishingly different children, his spiritual and aesthetic beliefs, and his eager embrace of other cultures – from Arab and Magyar to German and American Indian. It is impossible to read Colonel Roosevelt and not be awed by the man’s universality. The Colonel himself remarked, “I have enjoyed life as much as any nine men I know.” Morris does not hesitate, however, to show how pathologically TR turned upon those who inherited the power he craved – the hapless Taft, the adroit Woodrow Wilson. When Wilson declined to bring the United States into World War I in 1915 and 1916, the Colonel blasted him with some of the worst abuse ever uttered by a former chief executive. Yet even Wilson had to admit that behind the Rooseveltian will to rule lay a winning idealism and decency. “He is just like a big boy – there is a sweetness about him that you can’t resist.” That makes the story of TR’s last year, when the “boy” in him died, all the sadder in the telling: the conclusion of a life of Aristotelian grandeur. From the Hardcover edition.”
A Complicated Man: the Life of Bill Clinton as Told by Those Who Know Him by Michael Takiff (Find in our catalog)
Summary: “Though Bill Clinton has been out of office since 2001, public fascination with him continues unabated. Many books about Clinton have been published in recent years, but no single-volume biography covers the full scope of Clinton’s life from the cradle to the present day; and books on Clinton have tended to be highly polarized, casting the former president in an overly positive or negative light. In this, the first complete oral history of Clinton’s life, historian Michael Takiff presents the first truly balanced book on one of our nation’s most controversial and fascinating presidents. Through more than 150 chronologically arranged interviews with key figures including Bob Dole, James Carville, and Tom Brokaw, among many others, this book goes far beyond the well-worn party-line territory to capture the larger-than-life essence of Clinton the man.–From publisher description.”
Edward Kennedy: a Intimate Biography by Burton Hersh (Find in our catalog)
Summary: “A historian and journalist combines extensive research with observations from his long-time acquaintance with Kennedy to recount the influential senator’s life, including the Chappaquiddick accident and Kennedy’s behind-the-scenes efforts to bring down Nixon.” “A reporter who covered much of Edward Kennedy’s career, Hersh delivers a massive biography of the late “liberal lion” of the U.S. Senate. The author’s friendship with Kennedy has allowed him to include extensive new information on the Chappaquidick affair and the death of Mary Jo Kopechne (which came close to ending his political career), as well as on Richard Nixon’s vendetta against Kennedy, and on Kennedy’s behind-the-scenes role in the congressional investigations that led to the end of Nixon’s presidency. The book also deals frankly with Kennedy’s struggle with alcohol, and with his fear that he would be assassinated like his older brothers–a fear shown to be real after his death with the revelation of hundreds of death threats. Likely to be the definitive biography of Kennedy for some years to come, this eminently readable book will be a treat for readers interested in American politics and, especially, in the important role of that the Kennedy family played in politics for almost a half-century. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)”
Washington: a Life by Ron Chernow (Find in our catalog)
Summary: “In “Washington : a Life” celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation, dashing forever the stereotype of a stolid, unemotional man, and revealing an astute and surprising portrait of a canny political genius who knew how to inspire people.” “From National Book Award winner Ron Chernow, a landmark biography of George Washington. In Washington: A Life celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation. With a breadth and depth matched by no other one-volume life of Washington, this crisply paced narrative carries the reader through his troubled boyhood, his precocious feats in the French and Indian War, his creation of Mount Vernon, his heroic exploits with the Continental Army, his presiding over the Constitutional Convention, and his magnificent performance as America’s first president. Despite the reverence his name inspires, Washington remains a lifeless waxwork for many Americans, worthy but dull. A laconic man of granite self-control, he often arouses more respect than affection. In this groundbreaking work, based on massive research, Chernow dashes forever the stereotype of a stolid, unemotional man. A strapping six feet, Washington was a celebrated horseman, elegant dancer, and tireless hunter, with a fiercely guarded emotional life. Chernow brings to vivid life a dashing, passionate man of fiery opinions and many moods. Probing his private life, he explores his fraught relationship with his crusty mother, his youthful infatuation with the married Sally Fairfax, and his often conflicted feelings toward his adopted children and grandchildren. He also provides a lavishly detailed portrait of his marriage to Martha and his complex behavior as a slave master. At the same time, Washington is an astute and surprising portrait of a canny political genius who knew how to inspire people. Not only did Washington gather around himself the foremost figures of the age, including James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, but he also brilliantly orchestrated their actions to shape the new federal government, define the separation of powers, and establish the office of the presidency. In this unique biography, Ron Chernow takes us on a page-turning journey through all the formative events of America’s founding. With a dramatic sweep worthy of its giant subject, Washington is a magisterial work from one of our most elegant storytellers.”
Editor
Coming on September 16 and starring Sarah Jessica Parker, the movie based on the book I Don’t Know How She Does It: the Life of Kate Reddy, Working Mother by Allison Pearson (
License to Pawn: Deals, Steals, and my Life at the Gold & Silver by Rick Harrison with Tim Keown (
July marked the publication of George R.R. Martin’s A Dance with Dragons (
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt (
How the Irish saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill (
One Day, based on the novel by David Nicholls (
View this video from The Guardian newspaper of Alexander McCall Smith walking around Edinburgh
