Everyone wants to define the man who signed his name “A. Lincoln.” In his lifetime and ever since, friend and foe have taken it upon themselves to characterize Lincoln according to their own label or libel. In this magnificent book, Ronald C. White, Jr., offers a fresh and compelling definition of Lincoln as a man of integrity–what today’s commentators would call “authenticity”–whose moral compass holds the key to understanding his life.
Through meticulous research of the newly completed Lincoln Legal Papers, as well as of recently discovered letters and photographs, White provides a portrait of Lincoln’s personal, political, and moral evolution. White shows us Lincoln as a man who would leave a trail of thoughts in his wake, jotting ideas on scraps of paper and filing them in his top hat or the bottom drawer of his desk; a country lawyer who asked questions in order to figure out his own thinking on an issue, as much as to argue the case; a hands-on commander in chief who, as soldiers and sailors watched in amazement, commandeered a boat and ordered an attack on Confederate shore batteries at the tip of the Virginia peninsula; a man who struggled with the immorality of slavery and as president acted publicly and privately to outlaw it forever; and finally, a president involved in a religious odyssey who wrote, for his own eyes only, a profound meditation on “the will of God” in the Civil War that would become the basis of his finest address.
Most enlightening, the Abraham Lincoln who comes into focus in this stellar narrative is a person of intellectual curiosity, comfortable with ambiguity, unafraid to “think anew and act anew.”
A transcendent, sweeping, passionately written biography that greatly expands our knowledge and understanding of its subject, A. Lincoln will engage a whole new generation of Americans. It is poised to shed a profound light on our greatest president just as America commemorates the bicentennial of his birth.
What a refreshing read and pleasant experience this book is. Mr. White has the ability to convey so much information in an intelligent yet clear and easy-to-understand style. White takes the time to explain words or concepts that otherwise would send most readers to the dictionary. He couples this friendly presentation with all of the complexity and coverage of any other well-written presidential biography.
The author obviously possesses a wide-ranging and thorough knowledge of President Lincoln, his times and his presidency. As a biographical text about Abraham Lincoln, White's "A. Lincoln" provides great detail without sacrificing the larger picture.
Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals" is an excellent book about the history of and inner-workings of Lincoln and his cabinet - and I highly recommend her book. But White's "A. Lincoln" simply blows "Team of Rivals" out of the water in terms of being a well-focused yet richly detailed historical biography.
Here are a few things I didn't see mentioned in the editorial reviews praising this book: White liberally shares photographs, maps, illustrations, documents, even signatures of key characters. Unlike many history/biography books, these are not confined to a few glossy pages in the middle of the book, but appear frequently throughout the text, and really help give depth to the places, events, people, and times. This book includes an extensive notes section, the most thorough bibliography I've ever seen in a single-volume biography, and a 28-page index.
If you visit this book on randomhouse.com, you can find a link to Mr. White's personal web site. On his website, I found Mr. White's Speaking Dates calendar, which includes a visit here (Portland, Oregon) next week at the Oregon Historical Society. I will be there and I am looking forward to meeting and hearing from Mr. White.
Just in time for the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth comes Ronald C. White's fabulous tome, A. Lincoln: A Biography. From the opening words of the first chapter, this book is a literary work of art.
Lincoln signed all his papers with A. Lincoln. His friends called him simply Lincoln. "All through his life, people sought to complete the A--to define Lincoln, to label or libel him." For generations, "Americans have tried to explain the nation's most revered president." White provides for us a comprehensive look at his life. But the author also tries to define Lincoln through his words--both written and spoken. This job was made easier by the discovery of new Lincoln documents (especially legal documents) in recent years.
White begins Lincoln's journey with his humble birth, and takes us through his rustic childhood, his adventurous young adulthood, his awkward romantic experiences, his legal training, his circuit riding, political experiences and finally, his presidency. But what makes A. Lincoln so special is that White shows these events through the magnifying glass of Lincoln's writings. Whether it is a letter or a speech or just a note that Lincoln wrote to himself and stuffed in his silk top hat, White shows us how Lincoln evolved throughout his life to become one of our greatest leaders. The author also explains to us why Lincoln's writings are relevant today. "When contemporary Americans try to trace an inspired idea or a shimmering truth about our national identity, again and again we find Lincoln's initials carved on some tree--AL--for he was there before us." I had the pleasure of seeing Ronald White at the Free Library of Philadelphia recently. For his author talk, he passed out six different writings by Lincoln and analyzed them for us. But one gets the impression that White is just as much a lover of words, and of writing and a wordsmith as was Lincoln.
One section that I most enjoyed was how Lincoln started out as a bit of a bumbling president and ended up becoming a formidable leader and commander-in-chief. As in most everything, Lincoln was self-taught and once presented with a dilemma, went on a crash course to close the gaps in his meager education. The two major issues during his administration were the Civil War and the slavery issue. Halfway through his term, the president realized that he was not simply trying to preserve the Union, but to create a new Union. During the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln speaks of "a new birth of freedom" and a "new Union. The old union had attempted to contain slavery. The new Union would fulfill the promise of liberty."
A. Lincoln is just about as fine a biography as you could hope to read about Lincoln. It is made even more enjoyable by the dozens and dozens of photos, drawings, letters and maps that are scattered throughout. You can enjoy these things as you're reading--instead of having to keep leafing back and forth. Also, while this is a very comprehensive effort, one still has to realize that you won't find every single detail of Lincoln's life here. For instance, White treats Mary with sympathy and you won't find anything in his book about her apparent physical abuse of Lincoln. But overall, if you want the essence of the man, A. Lincoln will stand at the top of a very short list.
This is a thoroughly satisfying biography of a man who in steadfast loyalty to the founding values, himself embodies all of the great American attributes of character. Rising from strained familial circumstances, toiling in manual labor, teaching himself to read, teaching himself the law, rising from the virtue of his own effort to respected legislator to successful lawyer to leader of a nation in turmoil, it was another of God's blessings to send this agent of goodness to live long enough to see us through the dark pages of history and finish the business of the founding fathers.
This book is exceptionally satisfying in that it charts Lincoln's search for the right path in each occasion of his presidency by artfully parsing his speeches, which are literary gems. By virtue of Lincoln's integrity, his speeches illustrate how his vexing, hard won beliefs, the results of mental combat of the competing views of his day, ultimately complemented, and not contradicted his deeds. Let this biography be read as the best of scholarship but also to remind us that greatness arises from a sound moral and spiritual foundation and that it is often found among those who have suffered personal losses, as Lincoln surely did, having lost his mother, his only sister and his first love.
Have we seen a man since who so truly loves the values of our nation that his every act, even when detrimental to his ego, is to further that nation's evolution as a beam of light and hope in history? A leader who appoints his enemies because their talents too may used to further the common good. A leader who is so detached from self interest and so aligned with the nation's interest that he suffers mighty personal blows and even humiliation by a fellow attorney, only to appoint that person to one of the highest offices in the land. In the end, Lincoln's goodness burned holes through his enemies and his aims are achieved through the instruments of his wisdom and magnaminity.
I love that Lincoln always sought to do GOOD, always sought the highest value out of cruel reality. I love that he as an agent of Good, always probing his own consciousness and wrestling with religious and political values in order to forge the most sacred path possible in politics. In so doing, he led us to freedom from the chains of the subjugator and to a fuller sense of our destiny as a nation. Lincoln's life was one great leap for mankind.
The very tall man in the top hat stooped over books by the fireplace as a young man, and taught himself military arts to rival generals as a president. No natural and merciful and just king ever bent so low to serve his country, his ill fitting and frugal clothes belieing the sacred currency of a rich and pure American spirit.
