Lincoln President-Elect: Abraham Lincoln
and the Great Secession Winter 1860-1861
By Harold Holzer
Simon & Schuster, 640 pages, $30
Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer
By Fred Kaplan
Harper, 416 pages, $27.95
Tried By War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander In Chief
By James M. McPherson
Penguin, 384 pages, $35
Looking for Lincoln: The Making Read More
The Last Campaign: Robert F. Kennedy and the 82 Days that Inspired America
By Thurston Clarke
Henry Holt, 321 pages, $25
For a people whom Tocqueville described as living eternally in the future, we Americans do quite a lot of remembering. Eight weeks ago, it was Martin Luther King Jr., who has been gone longer Read More
JOURNALS: 1952-2000
By Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.
Penguin Press, 894 pages, $40
During the heady days of the Kennedy administration, there was a brief White House vogue for the journals of the Duc de Saint-Simon, the 18th-century courtier whose gemlike observations captured small, highly entertaining moments at Versailles that otherwise would have been Read More
I felt that I knew Arthur long before I actually met him, because of his books. Grad school was a bit of a wasteland, and I searched in vain for history books that would truly illuminate the past, with vivid writing, sharp observations and that rarest of all academic elements: humor. I found all three Read More
One score and nine years ago, Doris Kearns Goodwin launched her career as a Presidential historian with Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream, a shrewd look at the oversized Texan she’d observed closely during his Presidency and post-Presidency. In the years that followed, she built a stellar reputation as a writer and TV commentator on Read More
One score and nine years ago, Doris Kearns Goodwin launched her career as a Presidential historian with Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream, a shrewd look at the oversized Texan she’d observed closely during his Presidency and post-Presidency. In the years that followed, she built a stellar reputation as a writer and TV commentator on Read More
High above the intersection of Park Avenue and 26th Street, exactly where no one will notice it, a small metal sign silently proclaims the crossroads to be “Herman Melville Square.” So the city pays heed—barely—to the greatest writer ever to live and write here.
Of course, no one would ever call Melville obscure. Moby-Dick Read More
High above the intersection of Park Avenue and 26th Street, exactly where no one will notice it, a small metal sign silently proclaims the crossroads to be “Herman Melville Square.” So the city pays heed—barely—to the greatest writer ever to live and write here.
Of course, no one would ever call Melville obscure. Read More
The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House, by John F. Harris. Random House, 504 pages, $29.95.
Presidents move in the polls long after they leave office, and armchair historians can hold endless conversations about who belongs with the great, the near great and the mass of lesser mortals. Harry Truman departed the White House Read More
A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France and the Birth of America, by Stacy Schiff. Henry Holt, $30, 490 pages.
When George Bush launched his recent European charm offensive, he began his biggest speech with an attempt at levity. “I follow in some large footsteps,” he reminded the solons of Brussels, describing the extraordinary impact of Benjamin Read More
