Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation - Softcover

Ellis, Joseph J.

3.95

45,652 ratings by Goodreads

9780571212170: Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571212174 ISBN 13: 9780571212170

Publisher: Faber & Faber, 2002

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Founding Brothers is an illuminating, Pulitzer Prize-winning study of the intertwined lives of the founders of the American republic: Adams, Burr, Franklin, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, and Washington. During the 1790s these great statesmen came together to define the new republic and direct its course for the future. Ellis focuses on six key 'moments' in this era: Burr and Hamilton's deadly duel; the 'secret dinner' of Hamilton, Jefferson, and Madison, during which the seat of the nation's capital was determined; Franklin's petition to end slavery, and Madison's efforts to quash it; Washington's farewell address that offered his country some parting advice about US involvement in other nations' affairs; Adams's difficult term as Washington's successor; and Adams and Jefferson's correspondence at the end of their lives, in which they compared their views of the Revolution and its legacy.

In a lively and engaging narrative, Ellis shows us the private characters behind the public personas, and argues that the checks and balances that permitted the republic to endure were intensely personal, rooted in the dynamic interaction of these men. Founding Brothers informs our understanding of American politics - then, and now.

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Review:

Ellis has a penetrating mind and a light pen. -- The Times, 13 February 2002

This is a fine piece of historical analysis that can be read for pleasure - and how rare that is. -- Independent,13 February 2002

this short, engrossing, brilliantly coloured account. . . a work of deep scholarship successfully masquerading as popular history. -- Guardian, 2 March 2002

Synopsis:

Ellis recounts the sometimes collaborative, sometimes archly antagonistic interactions between these men, and shows us the private characters behind the public personas: Adams, the ever-combative iconoclast, whose closest political collaborator was his wife, Abigail; Burr, crafty, smooth, and one of the most despised public figures of his time for killing in a duel Alexander Hamilton, whose audacious manner and deep economic savvy masked his humble origins; jefferson, renowned for his eloquence, but so reclusive and taciturn that he rarely spoke more than a few sentences in public; Madison, small, sickly, and paralyzingly shy, yet one of the most effective debaters of his generation; and the stiffly formal Washington, the ultimate realist, larger-than-life, and America's only truly indispensable figure. Ellis argues that the checks and balances that permitted the infant American republic to endure were primarily intensely personal, rooted in the interaction of leaders with quite different values and gives us a new perspective on the unpredictable forces that shape history.

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