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Title: George Washington & the Founding of a Nation by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0-525-47068-9 Publisher: Dutton Books Pub. Date: 01 January, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (4 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A great book about a great man!
Comment: Marrin's book is history at its most entertaining and enlightening! Although targeted at young adults, I would also recommend it to many adult readers.
As someone who has read numerous "serious" history books that are frequently so dry and obtuse as to be inaccessable to the average reader, I would suggest Albert Marrin's George Washington & the Founding of a Nation. At 257 pages, the book is an enjoyable week's read covering all of the basic points of Washington's life and times. At its core it is fundamentally entertaining and would compare favorably with a Clancy or Grisham novel.
Marrin's work takes Washington down off his pedestal and displays the full humanity of the man. His tremendous courage and bravery, his sharp opportunism and the moral dilemmas he faced by owing slaves.
Marrin served as a junior high history teacher before becoming a university professor and eventually heading the history department at Yeshiva University in New York City. Clearly this is a man who spent his life making history come alive for young minds and he succeeds in this work both for young adults and for other adults who are looking for a greater appreciation of one of the key founders of the United States.
A special note for parents considering the work for young adults. Marrin's work is clearly inappropriate for younger children, but would be a great book for the child beginning to enter the world of adult reading. In Marrin's book the world is a far more complicated place than the world as explained in elementary school history texts. All of the historical figures are displayed with empathy and with their humanity open for inspection. The book should probably be rated R for violence, battle scenes are discussed realistically, and without being gratuitous, the author vividly describes the horrors of battle.
A section dealing with Washington's ownership of slaves, while depicting Washington as a relatively kind slave owner explains the dilemmas Washington faced and his ultimate hypocrisy in keeping slaves. A brief segment on how some planation owners mistreated slaves is particularly harrowing and gruesome at times.
As for sexuality, the book should be rated PG-13 as many of the British officers fall victim to the lovely ladies of Philadelphia.
Overall I highly recommend this book to individuals interested in learning more about George Washington and to young adults who are starting to enter the world of books aimed at mature readers.
Rating: 5
Summary: Fascinating History
Comment: I had to write this review because this is a fantastic book and it deserves a better rating than it has. I have read just about all of Marrin's books. He is my favorite author of history books for young adults. The reading style is always appropriate for younger readers (age 12 and up), but usually Marrin's books are too long for this target audience, who often struggle at reading anything that takes more than hour. I've seen kids I tried to get to read this book get turned-off after raising and lowering it a few times to assess its weight. In my view every page of Marrin's "George Washington" is worth reading. Marrin often finds choice excerpts from the primary literature that give you the feeling that you're really getting to know Washington and his times. Disregard the last customer review about inaccuracy. Marrin is a true historian and even if one quote wasn't verbatim, he didn't change its meaning.
I also disagree with the School Library Journal review saying that Milton Meltzer's "George Washington and the Birth of Our Nation" and Mary Pope Osborne's "George Washington: Leader of a New Nation" are equally fine biographies. Marrin has them both beat by miles. The writing is faster paced, the illustrations are better, and the book takes the subject to a greater depth.
Rating: 1
Summary: Inaccurate
Comment: This biography is a somewhat dark biography in that it focuses on the problems and not the incredible things that George Washington did. It also contains an inaccurate quote on page 54. The source of the quote is a letter to his brother John, where Washington is describing his incredible escape from an ambush near French-held Fort Duquesne. Every officer was killed and George Washington has 4 bullet holes in his cloak and 2 horses shot out from under him. In "The Writings of George Washington," George states: "But by the all-powerful dispensations of Providence, I have been protected beyond all human probability or expectation; for I had..." and he describes the situation to his brother. Albert Marrin changed this quote in his book to read: "I luckily escaped without a wound though I had..."
Many other books that have been written about George Washington have reduced Washington's quote or left it out altogether since it is a little long for children. But no one has changed it before...that is revisionistic, and unacceptable.
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Title: Commander in Chief: Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0525470697 Publisher: Dutton Books Pub. Date: 01 January, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.99 |
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Title: Napoleon and the Napoleonic Wars by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0670834807 Publisher: Penguin USA Pub. Date: 01 July, 1991 List Price(USD): $14.99 |
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Title: Unconditional Surrender: U.S. Grant and the Civil War by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0689318375 Publisher: Atheneum Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 1994 List Price(USD): $21.00 |
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Title: Sitting Bull and His World by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0525459448 Publisher: Dutton Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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Title: 1812: The War Nobody Won by Albert Marrin ISBN: 0689310757 Publisher: Atheneum Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 1985 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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