Synopses & Reviews
This is the first comprehensive biography of Willie Brown, one of California's most enduring and controversial politicians. Audacious, driven, talented -- Brown has dominated California politics longer and more completely than any other public figure.
"Richardson's story is not only of Brown, but of the modern political transformation of California.... By any measure Willie Brown is an extraordinary and consequential politician. And in the sterile landscapes at the end of our century, he's unique". -- John Balzar, Los Angeles Times
"Richardson ... suggests that Brown may be 'the last political showman of the 20th century.'... (Brown) has become for San Francisco what Jimmy Walker, before his fall, once was to New York. He has energized a glamorous city governed too long by earnest bumblers". -- Ron Fimrite, Washington Post Book World
"One of California's most important public figures in the past thirty years and among the most influential black politicians in American history. The recital of Brown's amazing sayings and doing, is reason enough to read Willie Brown, (a) vividly detained and scrupulously fair-minded biography". -- David L. Kirp, The Nation
Synopsis
This is the first comprehensive biography of Willie Brown, one of California's most enduring and controversial politicians. Audacious, driven, talentedand#151;Brown has dominated California politics longer and more completely than any other public figure. James Richardson, a senior writer for The Sacramento Bee, takes us from Brown's childhood, through his years as Speaker of the State Assembly, to his election as San Francisco's mayor. Along the way we get a riveting, behind-the-scenes account of three decades of California politics.
About the Author
James Richardson is a former senior writer for The Sacramento Bee who has covered Willie Brown and the California Legislature for the past decade. Currently he is Adjunct Professor at the Graduate School of Journalism, University of California, Berkeley.