Synopses & Reviews
Ten years in the making, the new book from Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon S. Wood reveals Benjamin Franklin's life and meaning.
Why did Benjamin Franklin retire from business and become gentleman? Why did he admire the British Empire--and join the American Revolution? Why did he being writing his Autobiography when he did? And how did the "first American" become an American in the first place?
Renowned historian Gordon S. Wood spent ten years studying a legend. In this untraditional biography, he penetrates beneath 200 years' accumulation of images and representations to find the historical Franklin. He places his subject's amazing life in its 18th century context an shatters forever the comforting stereotypes: homespun patriot, cracker-barrel philosopher, folksy founder, genial self-improver. Groundbreaking and riveting, this book is a must for anyone interested in American history and the roots of American character.
Review
. . . a fascinating portrait of Franklin, not only as a forefather but as a man.— Publishers Weekly
Synopsis
- Gordon S. Wood won the Pulitzer Prize for The Radicalism of the American Revolution
Synopsis
Pulitzer Prize-winner Wood scrutinizes the less typically-American traits possessed by Franklin--such as his longtime loyalty to the Crown--and why he still became one of the Revolution's necessary men. Abridged.
About the Author
Reader PETER JOHNSON has narrated numerous history and nonfiction works, including 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus.GORDON S. WOOD is a professor at Brown University and a renowned scholar of the early American republic. Among his books are The Radicalism of the American Revolution, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize, and The Creation of the American Republic 1776-1787, which garnered a Bancroft Prize. Professor Wood's scholarship has also been honored by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Historical Association, and the Huntington Library, where he was a recipient of the Fletcher Jones Distinguished Fellowship,