Overview

A concise, compelling biography of Washington and the forces that drove him What drove George Washington to become the preeminent man of his time and to secure a lasting reputation as one of history's great leaders? In this concise and engaging profile, Peter Henriques - a renowned Washington expert - recounts how Washington possessed a desperate desire to be seen, admired, honored, and above all to be remembered. Over the course of his life, Washington deliberately and self-consciously shaped his public image. Even his decision, dictated in his last will and testament, to emancipate the men and women he had held in slavery during his lifetime related directly to his desire to be perceived as honorable after his death and to safeguard his posthumous reputation. The complicated and controversial question of Washington and slavery is examined in an afterword to the biography. Written with a clarity that comes only from deep understanding, this biography goes right to the heart of what made Washington live, and succeed as the greatest of America's Founding Fathers.

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9780813954189

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Reviews

Henriques proposes an interpretative key to understanding this guarded, complex figure: from a young age he was preternaturally driven and ambitious and longed for recognition and glory. . . Henriques does not suggest that Washington's many virtues were not real, or that he sought to amass power for its own sake: 'Rather his glory was to be obtained by serving the greater good.' In a thoughtful coda to the book, Henriques takes up the question of Washington's relationship to slavery. His treatment of that thorny topic is as illuminating as the rest of this compelling account of Washington's remarkable rise. --National Review

Author Information

Peter R. Henriques is Professor of History Emeritus at George Mason University and the author of First and Always: A New Portrait of George Washington and Realistic Visionary: A Portrait of George Washington.

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