Zitat des Tages von Fred Kaplan:
It should be quite clear that it is possible for unpleasant people who are small in various ways other than in their artistic genius to produce great art. Art and morality have no necessary connection.
'Colonel Roosevelt' is compelling reading, and Morris a brilliant biographer who practices his art at the highest level.
The post-assassination Lincoln took on a greatly amplified importance to much of the American public, probably the president most deeply reviled in his lifetime and mostly highly regarded after his death.
Can a great artist be mean-spirited, grasping, harsh to his family, violent in his emotions, vindictive in his hatreds, an all-purpose scoundrel? If our test cases are the likes of Wagner, Picasso, and, let me say, Dickens, the answer is a resounding yes.
Lincoln is distinguished from every other president, with the exception of Jefferson, in that we can be certain that he wrote every word to which his name is attached.
We do ourselves a disservice when we self-servingly massage the record.
Serious biographies need to have a historical base in facts.
I'm not a Lincoln expert, rather a biographer who has had the pleasure of reading much of what has been written about him from his lifetime to this year of his bicentennial. Some advice: Don't try that unless you have at least five years available.
In his life, Charles Dickens was like the rest of us, but maybe more so: another poor and wonderful soul attempting to deal with his and the world's pain and confusion in the best way he knew how.
The value of Eric Foner's 'The Fiery Trial' lies in its comprehensive review of mostly familiar material; in its sensible evaluation of the full range of information already available about Abraham Lincoln and slavery; and in the deft thoroughness of its scholarship.
A recommendation to scholars: Write only one book about Lincoln; give it your best shot, and then move on.
To give credit to Lincoln for moral progression seems beyond the facts and unnecessary for our appreciation of this arguably greatest of all American presidents.
