Research Field: Biography, Collective and Individual, Americans to 1900. T. Slaughter (20180404) Biography Is a Genre and a Fi

Research Field: Biography, Collective and Individual, Americans to 1900.

T. Slaughter (20180404)

Biography is a genre and a field unto itself, the purview of journalists, amateurs, “professional biographers,” and academic historians. The nature of this mixed bag leads to a rather mixed reputation, which is itself distinctive. Most biography is linear and narrative, marching from a single person’s birth to death, although there have been attempts to shake that up, resulting in family and group biographies and some attempts to breach chronological narration. Not all biographies attempt to re-capture an entire life; some focus on an individual’s role in a single event or one aspect or period of a subject’s life. Multi-volume biographies are not represented in this list. Intellectual and literary biographies are one sub-field. There is no end of biographies of politicians, especially the Founding Fathers and Abraham Lincoln. Biographies of military figures are under-represented in this list; biographies of white people are over-represented.

Bremer, Francis J. John Winthrop: America’s Forgotten Founding Father. NY, 2003. Brodie, Fawn. Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History. NY, 1974. Burstein, Andrew and Nancy Isenberg. Madison and Jefferson. NY, 2010.

1 Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton. NY, 2004. Cleves, Rachel Hope. Charity and Sylvia; A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America. NY, 2014. Cole, Phyllis. Mary Moody Emerson and the Origins of Transcendentalism: A Family History. NY, 1996. Connell, Evan S. Son of the Morning Star: Custer and the Little Bighorn. San Francisco, 1994. Cooper, William J. The Lost Founding Father. NY, 2017. Dawidoff, Robert. The Education of John Randolph. NY, 1979. Delbanco, Andrew. Melville: His World and His Work. NY, 2005. Demos, John. The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story from Early America. NY, 1994. Ellis, Joseph J. Passionate Sage: The Character and Legacy of John Adams. NY, 1993. Ellis, Richard J. American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson. NY, 1996. Epstein, Daniel Mark. Lincoln and Whitman: Parallel Live in Civil War Washington. NY, 2004. Feldman, Noah. The Three Lives of James Madison. NY, 2017. Fischer, David Hackett. Paul Revere’s Ride. NY, 1994. Ginzberg, Lori D. Elizabeth Cady Stanton: An American Life. NY, 2009. Gordon, Lyndall. Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickinson and Her Family’s Feuds. NY, 2010. Gordon-Reed, Annette. The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family. NY, 2008. Holton, Woody. Abigail Adams. NY, 2009. Kaplan, Fred. John Quincy Adams: American Visionary. NY, 2014. LaPlante, Eve. Marmee and Louisa: The Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and her Mother. NY, 2012. Lewis, R. W. B. The Jameses: A Family Narrative. NY, 1991. Longmore, Paul K. The Invention of George Washington. Berkeley, 1988. Lutz, Deborah. The Brontë Cabinet: Three Lives in Nine Objects. NY, 2015. Marshall, Megan. The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism. NY, 2005. Menand, Louis. The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America. NY, 2001. Middlekauff, Robert. The Mathers: Three Generations of Puritan Intellectuals, 1596- 1728. NY, 1971. Morgan, Edmund S. The Gentle Puritan. Chapel Hill, 1962. O’Brien, Michael. Mrs. Adams in Winter: A Journey in the Last Days of Napoleon. NY, 2010. Reynolds, David S. Walt Whitman’s America: A Cultural Biography. NY, 1995. Rugoff, Milton. The Beechers: An American Family in the Nineteenth Century. NY 1981. Rybczynski, Witold. A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and America in the 19th Century. NY, 1999. Scharff, Virginia. The Women Jefferson Loved. NY, 2010. Schiff, Stacy. A Great Improvisation. NY, 2005. Showalter, Elaine. The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe; A Biography. NY, 2016. Sklar, Kathryn Kish. Catharine Beecher: A Study in American Domesticity. New Haven, 1973.

2 Stauffer, John. Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. NY, 2008. Thomas, Louisa. Louisa: The Extraordinary Life of Mrs. Adams. NY, 2016. Ulrich, Laurel Thatcher. A Midwife’s Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based On Her Diary, 1785-1812. New York, 1990. Van Doren, Carl. Benjamin Franklin. NY, 1938. Walls, Laura Dassow. Henry David Thoreau: A Life. Chicago, 2017. Wills, Gary. Cincinnaatus: George Washington and the Enlightenment. NY, 1984. White, Ronald C., Jr. A. Lincoln: A Biography. NY, 2009. Wood, Gordon S. Friends Divided: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. NY, 2017. Worster, Donald. A Passion for Nature: The Life of John Muir. NY, 2008. Young, Alfred F. The Shoemaker and the Tea Party: Memory and the American Revolution. Boston, 1999.

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