Lincoln (Modern Library) [Hardcover]

Gore Vidal (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 9, 1993 | Series: Modern Library

Gore Vidal's Narratives of Empire series spans the history of the United States from the Revolution to the post-World War II years. With their broad canvas and large cast of fictional and historical characters, the novels in this series present a panorama of the American political and imperial experience as interpreted by one of its most worldly, knowing, and ironic observers.

To most Americans, Abraham Lincoln is a monolithic figure, the Great Emancipator and Savior of the Union, beloved by all. In Gore Vidal's Lincoln we meet Lincoln the man and Lincoln the political animal, the president who entered a besieged capital where most of the population supported the South and where even those favoring the Union had serious doubts that the man from Illinois could save it. Far from steadfast in his abhorrence of slavery, Lincoln agonizes over the best course of action and comes to his great decision only when all else seems to fail. As the Civil War ravages his nation, Lincoln must face deep personal turmoil, the loss of his dearest son, and the harangues of a wife seen as a traitor for her Southern connections. Brilliantly conceived, masterfully executed, Gore Vidal's Lincoln allows the man to breathe again.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Superb . . . a grand entertainment. . . . A plausible and human Lincoln, of us and yet beyond us." --Harold Bloom

"A portrait of America's great president that is at once intimate and public, stark and complex, and that will become for future generations the living Lincoln, the definitive Lincoln. . . . Richly entertaining . . . history lessons with the blood still hot." --The Washington Post

"[Lincoln] is in Vidal's version at once more complex, mysterious and enigmatic, more implacably courageous and, finally, more tragic than the conventional images, the marble man of the memorial. He is honored in the book." --Chicago Tribune


From the Trade Paperback edition.

From the Inside Flap

Gore Vidal's Narratives of Empire series spans the history of the United States from the Revolution to the post-World War II years. With their broad canvas and large cast of fictional and historical characters, the novels in this series present a panorama of the American political and imperial experience as interpreted by one of its most worldly, knowing, and ironic observers.

To most Americans, Abraham Lincoln is a monolithic figure, the Great Emancipator and Savior of the Union, beloved by all. In Gore Vidal's Lincoln we meet Lincoln the man and Lincoln the political animal, the president who entered a besieged capital where most of the population supported the South and where even those favoring the Union had serious doubts that the man from Illinois could save it. Far from steadfast in his abhorrence of slavery, Lincoln agonizes over the best course of action and comes to his great decision only when all else seems to fail. As the Civil War ravages his nation, Lincoln must face deep personal turmoil, the loss of his dearest son, and the harangues of a wife seen as a traitor for her Southern connections. Brilliantly conceived, masterfully executed, Gore Vidal's Lincoln allows the man to breathe again.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Modern Library (February 9, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679600485
• ISBN-13: 978-0679600480
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.8 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #798,372 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the best book on Lincoln I've ever read., May 11, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Lincoln (Modern Library) (Hardcover)

People who prefer their presidents -- especially the "great" ones -- wreathed in hagiographical haloes had better look elsewhere for a view of the president who re-founded the United States. Vidal's portrait of this most interesting (and, given the sum of his achievements, our greatest) president accurately renders the Lincoln that I have come to know through a close reading of many of "Father Abraham's" own writings.

That being the case, be forewarned that this novel came under fire from the academics who, having failed in their self-appointed task of shaping American history to fit their own political agendas, sought to discredit an artist who took Lincoln as he (and the historical record) found him. (For a complete discussion of this controversy from Vidal's perspective, see his wonderfully entertaining "United States.")

From Lincoln's 1838 address to the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield (when he spoke of ambitious men who would eschew the path laid out by the country's founders, in order to carve for themselves an equal or higher niche in the pantheon of fame, whether it be by freeing the slaves or enslaving free men), to his farewell address to his fellow citizens of Springfield, we have historical evidence that this was a man with his eye on more than just a political office. So much so that one fair interpretation (such as Vidal's) could be that he did (and said, especially in his "House Divided" speech) more than a little of his own to bring on our nation's bloodiest war.

This kind of thinking, of course, does seem to rattle the hagiogaphers of the Ken Burns school, who would have us think that the Civil War was about slavery. Period. End of sentence. End of thought.

About slavery it certainly was; but there were other issues (labor and capitalism,for instance)that, for a variety of reasons, the hagiographers do not touch. Is it because by raising the question of "slaves without masters," to quote the pro-slavery apologi! st George Fitzhugh's critique of Northern capitalism, we remind ourselves of the very precarious economic world that we still inhabit, a world that the South fought to keep at bay as long as it could? To keep from asking such questions, modern-day mandrakes endeavor to divert our attention from the hard questions raised by the Civil War (and by Lincoln's own conduct and words) and keep our vision focused on the horrors of slavery, and the sainthood of the man responsible for ending it.

Abraham Lincoln deserves his due as a great man, a great president, and a genius to boot. He did indeed supplant Washington in our minds, and it is fitting that he did: for the Old Republic that people thought they were getting in the time of Washington is no more. Perhaps it was inevitable that it died; certainly it is true that a polity based upon human exploitation and bias towards the big money men deserves to die. But that raises the question of what we have got in return. This book is a magnificent portrait of the man who, for better or for worse, ushered in the new ages of gild, industrialism, and imperialism, the ages that, as Gideon Welles said upon his death, he now belongs.