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Title: Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
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Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
List Price: $18.00
Our Price: $7.99
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| Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster The Bountiful Life of a Fascinating Founder | Walter Isaacson has penned an enjoyable, informative and well-paced biography on the incredible life and historic times of Benjamin Franklin.
With crisp overviews of personalities like John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and Edward Bancroft - to name but a few - Isaacson brings a wonderful dimension to describing a complete picture of many issues.
Though the chapter - Bon Vivant: Paris, 1778-1785 - briefly slows the pace of the nearly 500 pages, this is an entertaining read which shows how history can come to life through the energetic research of an author. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster Well Done! | | A very entertaining and highly informative bio. It seems as though Mr.Franklin gets slighted in other subjects bio's, mainly for being away from America for so long during the Revolutionary years. But you'll find in this enjoyable bio that he was hardly sitting around doing nothing during his time in France. His strength was in diplomacy and knowing how to manipulate France and Britain to our benefit, and was a major influence in the outcome of our quest for freedom. Also, take a good look around you, chances are that he had something to do with the invention or idea that brought whatever it is you're looking at to fruition. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster The Other Side of Ben Franklin | | When I took US History in College, the various instructors took pot shots at Benjamin Franklin, not really giving the poor old guy a chance. This book give a more balanced look at Ben's whole life and the events that changed his outlook on life. I still take to heart his creed to never speak sharply or argue in anger with anyone, speak softly and use reason to convince your fellow man (woman). This advice alone has allowed my to make headway in places that I would have never been able to before. This book also gives the reader the sense of sadness regarding Franklin's family, especially the very long time periods that he was away from his wife. Tragically, his wife died without him while he was in France. Franklin gave much to this country, I appreciate his contributions to this day and I read this book years ago. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster Tremendous biography | | This is exactly what I look for in a biography -- it's about one of the most important people in the history of our country, and after I was about a chapter into the book, I could not put it down. I found myself reading it every time I had a free moment. It is easy to read and loaded with useful and interesting information about a fascinating man. I would recommend this to anyone, whether it be a history buff or just someone who enjoys a good read. On a side note, it's funny to me how differently the Franklin-John Adams relationship is portrayed by Isaacson compared to how David McCullough described it in his Adams book. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster The Father of His Country | Isaacson persuasively portrays Franklin as the cultural father of his country. Washington may have been more important from a political perspective, but culturally he was part of an aristocratic, noblesse oblige, and chilvaric tradition that is more European than American. Franklin was the champion of middle class values -- the protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism and the virtues of the common man.
Presidents starting with Jackson ran as the embodiment of Franklin, not of Washington. No one wants to be portrayed as elitist, and Franklin's promotion of social mobility and middle class virtues became the standard.
Isaacson's book is readable and interesting. He certainly makes a persuasive case for Franklin's seminal importance in American history. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster Product Description | | Benjamin Franklin is the founding father who winks at us, the one who seems made of flesh rather than marble. In this authoritative and engrossing full-scale biography, Walter Isaacson shows how the most fascinating of America's founders helped define our national character. In a sweeping narrative that follows Franklin's life from Boston to Philadelphia to London and Paris and back, Isaacson chronicles the adventures of the spunky runaway apprentice who became, during his 84-year life, America's best writer, inventor, media baron, scientist, diplomat, and business strategist, as well as one of its most practical and ingenious political leaders. He explores the wit behind Poor Richard's Almanac and the wisdom behind the Declaration of Independence, the new nation's alliance with France, the treaty that ended the Revolution, and the compromises that created a near-perfect Constitution. Above all, Isaacson shows how Franklin's unwavering faith in the wisdom of the common citizen and his instinctive appreciation for the possibilities of democracy helped to forge an American national identity based on the virtues and values of its middle class. | | Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Simon & Schuster Amazon.com | | Benjamin Franklin, writes journalist and biographer Walter Isaacson, was that rare Founding Father who would sooner wink at a passer-by than sit still for a formal portrait. What's more, Isaacson relates in this fluent and entertaining biography, the revolutionary leader represents a political tradition that has been all but forgotten today, one that prizes pragmatism over moralism, religious tolerance over fundamentalist rigidity, and social mobility over class privilege. That broadly democratic sensibility allowed Franklin his contradictions, as Isaacson shows. Though a man of lofty principles, Franklin wasn't shy of using sex to sell the newspapers he edited and published; though far from frivolous, he liked his toys and his mortal pleasures; and though he sometimes gave off a simpleton image, he was a shrewd and even crafty politician. Isaacson doesn't shy from enumerating Franklin’s occasional peccadilloes and shortcomings, in keeping with the iconoclastic nature of our time--none of which, however, stops him from considering Benjamin Franklin "the most accomplished American of his age," and one of the most admirable of any era. And here’s one bit of proof: as a young man, Ben Franklin regularly went without food in order to buy books. His example, as always, is a good one--and this is just the book to buy with the proceeds from the grocery budget. --Gregory McNamee |
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