Abraham Lincoln: A Biography [Hardcover]

Benjamin P. Thomas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 15, 1952

Front flap notes: "This book, a publishing event of the first magnitude, will become the standard one-volume life of Lincoln for a generation to come. 'Thomas's Lincoln' will soon become as familiar a phrase in literate households as 'Charnwood's Lincoln' was in our parents' time. In the intervening thirty-five years, experts have examined many phases of the Great Emancipator. But none has drawn off to catch the whole man, as Benjamin P. Thomas has done. Here for the first time in modern publishing is the grand synthesis. Here at last is a biography for laymen and experts alike; for the young and for the old; for the beginner who wishes a first true view of our greatest President, and for the well-read man who looks for the latest refinements of scholarly judgment. As a crowning achievement, Thomas's Lincoln will stand as a work of art as well as an accurate biography incorporating the fruits of modern research. It is beautifully written, continuously absorbing; and it will bring to every reader a portrait that is fresh and new and exciting. It includes 4 handsome maps; 29 unusual and exceptionally interesting contemporary photographs; and an appendix discussing other books on Lincoln that in itself is a fascinating picture of our changing views of our greatest President."

Product Details

• Hardcover: 574 pages
• Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf; 1st edition (June 15, 1952)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394433343
• ISBN-13: 978-0394433349
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,540,001 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the 3 Best 1-Volume Biographies of Lincoln, March 20, 2004

By 

Kenneth P. Cash (Independence, Ohio United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Abraham Lincoln: A biography (Loose Leaf)

I have been studying Abraham Lincoln for nearly 40 years. Many Lincoln scholars consider ABRAHAM LINCOLN: A BIOGRAPHY by Benjamin P. Thomas to be one of the three best one-volume biographies of Lincoln written to date. The other two books are LINCOLN by David Herbert Donald and WITH MALICE TOWARD NONE by Stephen B. Oates.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Readable, April 7, 2004

By 

C. L Wilson (Elmhurst, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Abraham Lincoln: A biography (Loose Leaf)

Very readable one volume life of Lincoln. Pulled things together in a way Sandburg's six volume masterpeice could not. A case of not being able to see the forest for the trees. And made utterly clear exactly what Lincoln was fighting for: that democracy as evidenced by the people's vote at the ballot box might survive as an example to the world. If all the states had voted in elections to let the succeeding states go, then OK. But there was no such election. It was always the Union, never slavery, that was his purpose, although he understood slavery to be at the heart of the matter.