Nagel

1997 · 2311772 — New York: Alfred A. Knopf 1997. First Edition. Hard Cover. Good/Near Fine. First edition. Jacket near fine. Ink underlining and marginalia a few pages dog-eared. 1997 Hard Cover. We have more books available by this author!. xi 432 pp. "February 21 1848 the House of Representatives Washington D.C.: Congressman John Quincy Adams rising to speak suddenly collapses at his desk; two days later he dies in the Speaker's chamber. The public mourning that followed writes Paul C. Nagel "exceeded anything previously seen in America." Forgotten was his failed presidency and his often cold demeanor. It was the memory of an extraordinary human being--one who in his last years had fought heroically for the right of petition and against a war to expand slavery--that drew a grateful people to salute his coffin in the Capitol and to stand by the railroad tracks as his bier was transported from Washington to Boston. Nagel probes deeply into the psyche of this cantankerous misanthropic erudite hardworking son of a former president whose remarkable career spanned many offices: minister to Holland Russia and England U.S. senator secretary of state president of the United States 1825-1829 and finally U.S. representative the only ex-president to serve in the House. On the basis of a thorough study of Adams' seventy-year diary among a host of other documents the author gives us a richer account than we have yet had of JQA's life--his passionate marriage to Louisa Johnson his personal tragedies two sons lost to alcoholism his brilliant diplomacy his recurring depression his exasperating behavior--and shows us why in the end only Abraham Lincoln's death evoked a greater outpouring of national sorrow in nineteenth-century America. We come to see how much Adams disliked politics and hoped for more from life than high office; how he sought distinction in literary and scientific endeavors and drew his greatest pleasure from being a poet critic translator essayist botanist and professor of oratory at Harvard; how tension between the public and private Adams vexed his life; and how his frustrations kept him masked and aloof and unpopular. Nagel's great achievement in this first biography of America's sixth president in a quarter century is finally to portray Adams in all his talent and complexity. Alfred A. Knopf hardcover books