Sketch of the Life of Abraham Lincoln

Arnold, Isaac N., 1815-1884Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.6

Word count: 158K words
Chapters: 16

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Sketch of the life of Abraham Lincoln by Isaac N. ArnoldAuthor: Arnold, Isaac N., 1815-1884,Language: English, Class: E456: History: America: Civil War period (1861-1865), Release Date: Oct 22, 2011

Editor's review

A short life of Lincoln by Isaac N. Arnold. Though brief, it comes from a contemporary of Lincoln who knew his political career well, giving it a distinctive quality somewhere between memoir and biography. It is not a comprehensive modern biography but rather an immediate sketch of Lincoln's character, political judgment, and public life by a man of his own time, letting readers sense how Lincoln's image was shaped within the political context of nineteenth-century America. As a free electronic text from Project Gutenberg, the book serves well as supplementary introductory material for understanding Lincoln and as a sample of early biographical narrative for researchers. Readers should note that the author takes an openly admiring stance and writes in the rhetoric of his era; it should not be treated as neutral historical source material. Read alongside modern Lincoln biographies and Civil War histories, it offers both the warmth of a contemporary perspective and the critical distance necessary for sound judgment.

Who it's for

A good fit for

General readers who want a quick outline of Lincoln's life
Scholars studying the history of Lincoln's image and early biographical narrative
Teachers and students needing brief English primary materials for American history courses
Readers who enjoy nineteenth-century biographical prose and sketches of political figures

Not a good fit for

Advanced researchers seeking detailed chronologies and exhaustive biographical evidence
Readers hoping for a neutral, balanced account of multiple perspectives
Readers who need a Chinese translation and are uncomfortable with old-fashioned English

Reading tips

Read through once for the overall thread, then return to sort out the author's assessments of Lincoln's character and political choices.
Note the praise-laden vocabulary the author uses and consider the rhetorical strategies of contemporary biography.
Compare with corresponding chapters of modern Lincoln biographies to see differences in source selection and narrative emphasis.
Given its limited length, read it in two or three sittings and jot down a few points after each to keep details from slipping by.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book suitable as an introduction to Lincoln biographies?

It can serve as a supplementary introduction, but not as the only introductory book. It is short and focused, quickly presenting Lincoln as his contemporaries saw him; to build a complete biographical framework, pair it with a modern general biography.

What was the author's relationship to Lincoln?

According to the book's materials, the author Isaac N. Arnold was a nineteenth-century American political figure of the same era as Lincoln. The book is written as a "sketch," carrying a contemporary's observation and admiration; readers should understand its narrative stance accordingly and not expect the neutral distance of modern academic biography.

Is the narrative completely objective?

No. Nineteenth-century biography often carried clear praise and blame, and this book takes an admiring stance toward Lincoln, with tendencies in both selection and wording. Read it as a historical narrative text and consider why the author wrote as he did, rather than taking it as an uncontested factual record.

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About the author

Arnold, Isaac N., 1815-1884 Author · American · 1815–1884

Isaac N. Arnold (1815–1884) was an American lawyer and U.S. Representative, and a friend of Abraham Lincoln. The library currently holds one work by him, Sketch of the Life of Abraham Lincoln. Public information about his early education, official career, and specific political activities is limited, and this entry does not speculate on them. Judging from his surviving work, he wrote on figures and events he had witnessed firsthand, in plain and factual prose that follows the course of events and reflects a contemporary's close observation of Lincoln. Such biographical sketches by friends are a useful source for understanding how nineteenth-century American political figures were portrayed and for early Lincoln studies, offering later readers a participant's perspective.