Review by Library Journal Review
Alford (history, Northern Virginia Community Coll.; Prince Among Slaves) presents a nuanced, in-depth biography of John Wilkes Booth (1838-65), the well-known stage actor and frustrated Confederate sympathizer who assassinated Abraham Lincoln in 1865. While many books have described Booth's role in Lincoln's assassination, -Alford's goal is a wider inquiry into Booth's life as a whole. As a celebrated dramatic actor, Booth was a notable public figure of the day whose prodigious talents often hid a darker side of erratic behavior and political obsessions. Utilizing a wide range of research materials to thoroughly examine and re-create Booth's childhood, personality, family relationships, courtships, acting career, and anti-abolitionist views, Alford seeks to provide a holistic portrait of a previously mysterious or caricatured man. This well-researched and clearly written work provides a vivid, gripping portrait of the charming, impetuous, and troubled Booth, whose ill-fated and ultimately murderous path often seems to strangely echo the doomed Shakespearean characters he played on stage. Although occasionally slowed by excess detail, Alford's narrative excels in illuminating the complicated road that led Booth to become an assassin and in elucidating the human complexity of a reviled historical figure. VERDICT Best suited to history fans or researchers interested in the history of the theatre, Lincoln's assassination, or the Civil War. Those readers may also like Michael W. Kauffman's American Brutus.- Ingrid Levin, Salve Regina Univ. Lib., Newport, RI © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The "first full-length biography" of Abraham Lincoln's assassin offers much nuance and complexity to the killer, bordering on the downright sympathetic.Reams have been written about John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865), who was shot in the ensuing manhunt on April 26, 1865, at the age of 26, yet much of the anecdotal claims have been tempered by hysteria over the assassination and don't hold up to the light. Alford (History/Northern Virginia Community Coll.; Prince Among Slaves, 1976) sifts through the more balanced, credible sources of those who knew Booth before the assassination to flesh out a surprisingly engaging portrait of the brilliant young actor and deeply riven sympathizer to the Southern cause. The product of a British-born actor father (and bigamist) who settled his family in Virginia and grew alcoholic and erratic, young Booth was, by all accounts, a winning personality and a favorite of his mother and his numerous siblings. Agreeing early on not to bring her grief by enlisting in the Army when the war broke out, Booth worked at various stages in Northern cities during the conflict at the behest of his older, more seasoned actor brother, Edwin. He essentially stifled his true anti-abolitionist feelings, which had been radicalized with John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry. (A clue to Booth's increasingly obsessive behavior was the fact that he attended Brown's hanging.) Alford portrays a young man who was delighted by the applause, riches and fame he gained in his brief, meteoric rise as a dramatic actor yet alarmed by the national disintegration and tormented by his uselessness: Did his obsessive plotting about Lincoln grow out of his sense of duty to his beleaguered South, or was it a fantastic "self-conscious performance with himself as star"? Alford paints some intriguing shades of gray in this elucidating portrait. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
