American Heroes: Profiles of Men and Women Who Shaped Early America

by Edmund S. Morgan

Overview

"A wise, humane and beautifully written book." —Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal

From the best-selling author of Benjamin Franklin comes this remarkable work that will help redefine our notion of American heroism. Americans have long been obsessed with their heroes, but the men and women dramatically portrayed here are not celebrated for the typical banal reasons contained in Founding Fathers hagiography. Effortlessly challenging those who persist in revering the American history status quo and its tropes and falsehoods, Morgan, now ninety-three, continues to believe that the past is just not the way it seems.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393074260
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	05/10/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	304
File size:	417 KB

About the Author

Edmund S. Morgan (1916–2013) was the Sterling Professor Emeritus at Yale University and the recipient of the National Humanities Medal, the Pulitzer Prize, and the American Academy’s Gold Medal. The author of The Genuine Article; American Slavery, American Freedom; Benjamin Franklin; and American Heroes, among many others.

Editorial Reviews

"Further evidence of the depth and breadth of [Morgan's] research, the nimbleness of his mind, and his willingness to dissent from received wisdom."

Jonathan Yardley

"Whether in gentle praise or cutting criticism, Morgan’s utter immersion in the world of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is so palpable as to be a gift to those who experience it through him....you owe it to yourself to read American Heroes and remember the pure pleasure great history by a consummate artist affords."

History News Network - Jim Cullen

"About [Harvard's Perry] Miller, an authority on early America, Mr. Morgan writes that his 'distinction lay in an extraordinary ability to discover order where others saw chaos, and to express his deepest insights without uttering them, by tracing unsuspected patterns in the raw materials of the past.' The same might be said about Mr. Morgan, whose virtues as a historian are testified to in this wise, humane and beautifully written book."

Wall Street Journal - Bret Stephens

"Morgan shines whatever the century or topic."

Chicago Tribune - Kirk Davis Swinehart

"There is something here for everyone with even a passing interest in a past that remains, somehow, present."

Philadelphia Inquirer - David Waldstreicher