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Ambrose roams the country's history, praising the men and women who made it exceptional. He considers Jefferson and Washington, who were progressive thinkers (while living a contradiction as slaveholders), and celebrates Lincoln and Roosevelt. He recounts Andrew Jackson's stunning defeat of a superior British force in the battle of New Orleans with a ragtag army in the War of 1812. He brings to life Lewis and Clark's grueling journey across the wilderness and the building of the railroad that joined the nation coast to coast. Taking swings at political correctness, as well as his own early biases, Ambrose grapples with the country's historic sins of racism; its ill treatment of Native Americans; and its tragic errors such as the war in Vietnam, which he ardently opposed. He contrasts the modern presidencies of Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, and Johnson. He considers women's and civil rights, immigration, philanthropy, and nation building. Most powerfully, in this final volume, Ambrose offers an accolade to the historian's mighty calling.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
July 1, 2004 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780743549271
- File size: 129441 KB
- Duration: 04:29:40
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Popular historian Stephen E. Ambrose, who died last year at age 66, shares his views on the evolution of the United States and on his own life. He notes that U.S. history is full of contradictions, starting with Thomas Jefferson, who held slaves but inspired the eventual end of slavery through his eloquent writings. Ultimately Ambrose is optimistic about our nation's progress. Even in his own life, he finds contradictions, recalling his own failure to break up a campus men's club and reconciling it with his later support for women's rights. Jeffrey DeMunn reads Ambrose's words with a personal tone that makes you forget that the voice you're hearing isn't Ambrose's. J.A.S. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine -
Stephen Ambrose reads the introduction in the breathy voice of old age. He's dead now, but Henry Strozier takes up the torch, reading the body of the text as a younger Ambrose might have done, forceful, confident, and charming. Part memoir and part history of the U.S., this is the last valentine from a historian who saw our nation's flaws, and got over them. Yes, slavery was wicked--gone now. Discrimination against recent immigrants was misguided, but we are getting over that as well. The twenty-first century, Ambrose hopes, will be ruled by one superpower, a mongrel state of many races, and many nationalities, displaying unexpected strength and unexpected kindness. B.H.C. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine
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November 11, 2002
Before his recent, untimely death from cancer, Ambrose seemed to feel he had reached that age when a historian should write a memoir, which means writing yet another history book but replacing footnotes and analysis with anecdotes and opinions. Ambrose castigates the slave-holding founders of American liberty, celebrates the heroes of the slighted Battle of New Orleans and argues that white settlers treated Native Americans no worse than the tribes treated one another. On he goes, damning and praising, through the Vietnam War (which he firmly opposed), appending personal observations on racism, immigration, women's rights and America's nation-building mission. Halfway through, he pauses to recount his development as a historian and writer, from his master's thesis and his biographies of Eisenhower and Nixon to his more recent, bestselling books Undaunted Courage, Nothing Like It in the World
and numerous titles on WWII. This personal narrative, dropped into the middle of the book, with revelations about his family life and encounters with famous war veterans, is what Ambrose fans really want to read. It is a pity that Ambrose (or his editors) decided to structure his ruminations and reflections according to historical chronology, because readers looking for his life story will have to take notes and write it themselves. In the process, Ambrose apparently hopes, they will learn what he claims the study of other men's lives has taught him: a broad-minded sympathy that acknowledges an individual's flaws yet focuses on positive achievements. (Nov. 11)Forecast:This was probably destined for the bestseller list all along, and cynical though it may seem to say, the popular historian's death will probably help fuel sales.
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