And There Was Light - by Jon Meacham

Book Synopsis

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer and #1 New York Times bestselling author Jon Meacham chronicles the life of Abraham Lincoln, charting how--and why--he confronted secession, threats to democracy, and the tragedy of slavery to expand the possibilities of America.

A president who governed a divided country has much to teach us in a twenty-first-century moment of polarization and political crisis. Hated and hailed, excoriated and revered, Abraham Lincoln was at the pinnacle of American power when implacable secessionists gave no quarter in a clash of visions bound up with money, race, identity, and faith. In him we can see the possibilities of the presidency as well as its limitations.

At once familiar and elusive, Lincoln tends to be seen as the greatest of American presidents--a remote icon--or as a politician driven more by calculation than by conviction. This illuminating new portrait gives us a very human Lincoln--an imperfect man whose moral antislavery commitment, essential to the story of justice in America, began as he grew up in an antislavery Baptist community; who insisted that slavery was a moral evil; and who sought, as he put it, to do right as God gave him to see the right.

This book tells the story of Lincoln from his birth on the Kentucky frontier in 1809 to his leadership during the Civil War to his tragic assassination in 1865: his rise, his self-education, his loves, his bouts of depression, his political failures, his deepening faith, and his persistent conviction that slavery must end. In a nation shaped by the courage of the enslaved of the era and by the brave witness of Black Americans, Lincoln's story illustrates the ways and means of politics in a democracy, the roots and durability of racism, and the capacity of conscience to shape events.

Review Quotes

"With this deep, compelling work, Jon Meacham has achieved this gold standard. Written with wisdom and grace, his story of Lincoln's complex moral journey to Emancipation mirrors America's long and troubled quest to live up to its founding ideals."--Doris Kearns Goodwin, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author of Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln

"So much more than another account of Abraham Lincoln's life, Jon Meacham's profound new biography dives into Lincoln's very soul, and the result is one of the most compelling and absorbing portraits ever crafted. This is a book of such high drama and deep emotion that it instantly takes its place at the forefront of the Lincoln literature."--Harold Holzer, Winner of the Lincoln Prize, author of Lincoln and the Power of the Press

"Jon Meacham's masterful, highly readable biography of Lincoln is a most worthy companion to his Pulitzer Prize-winning American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House. In an era when autocracy is on the march, this timely book sheds a bright light on Lincoln's role as a paladin and vindicator of democracy."--Michael Burlingame, Lincoln Prize-winning author of Abraham Lincoln: A Life

"Jon Meacham has given us a Lincoln for our perilous times, a story where slavery and racism are not an afterthought but are critical to understanding the man, the moment, and the contradictions at the heart of this fragile Republic. With the elegance of his pen and the power of story, Meacham draws a portrait of a complex man who answered the call of history. And There Was Light offers us an all-too-human exemplar for our current storms."--Eddie Glaude, Jr., James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor and Chair of the Department of African American Studies, Princeton University, and author of Begin Again and Democracy in Black

"Jon Meacham's acute understanding of American politics yields a singularly illuminating portrait of the greatest political leader in our history. Meacham's Lincoln is no prophet or saint, but no prophet or saint could have accomplished what he did."--Sean Wilentz, George Henry Davis 1886 Professor of American History, Princeton University, and Bancroft Prize-winning author of The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln

"In his captivating new book, Jon Meacham has given us the Lincoln for our time. And There Was Light brilliantly interweaves the best of gripping narrative history with a deeper search for the complex interplay among morality, politics, and power in a life, in a democracy, in an America ripped apart over slavery. Here Meacham takes us to the heart of the president who shaped events at 'the existential hour.' In doing so, he fortifies us to meet our own."--Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University, and New York Times bestselling author of The Black Church

About the Author

Jon Meacham is a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer. The Rogers Chair in the American Presidency at Vanderbilt University, he is the author of the New York Times bestsellers His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope, Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush, Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power, American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House, American Gospel, and Franklin and Winston. A fellow of the Society of American Historians, Meacham lives in Nashville.