Drawn with the Sword
Format: Hardcover
ISBN13: 9780195096798
Hardcover|9780195096798
✨ Featured Offer
Used, Like New
$5.94
List Price: $43.99
🚚
See all 5 offers from $5.94 FREE standard delivery by: 05 Apr 2026
Overview
James M. McPherson is acclaimed as one of the finest historians writing today and a preeminent commentator on the Civil War. Battle Cry of Freedom, his Pulitzer Prize-winning account of that conflict, was a national bestseller that Hugh Brogan, in The New York Times, called "history writingof the highest order." Now, in Drawn With the Sword, McPherson offers a series of thoughtful and engaging essays on some of the most enduring questions of the Civil War, written in the masterful prose that has become his trademark.Filled with fresh interpretations, puncturing old myths and challenging new ones, Drawn With the Sword explores such questions as why the North won and why the South lost (emphasizing the role of contingency in the Northern victory), whether Southern or Northern aggression began the war, and whoreally freed the slaves, Abraham Lincoln or the slaves themselves. McPherson offers memorable portraits of the great leaders who people the landscape of the Civil War: Ulysses S. Grant, struggling to write his memoirs with the same courage and determination that marked his successes on thebattlefield; Robert E. Lee, a brilliant general and a true gentleman, yet still a product of his time and place; and Abraham Lincoln, the leader and orator whose mythical figure still looms large over our cultural landscape. And McPherson discusses often-ignored issues such as the development of theCivil War into a modern "total war" against both soldiers and civilians, and the international impact of the American Civil War in advancing the cause of republicanism and democracy in countries from Brazil and Cuba to France and England. Of special interest is the final essay, entitled "What's theMatter With History?", a trenchant critique of the field of history today, which McPherson describes here as "more and more about less and less." He writes that professional historians have abandoned narrative history written for the greater audience of educated general readers in favor ofimpenetrable tomes on minor historical details which serve only to edify other academics, thus leaving the historical education of the general public to films and television programs such as Glory and Ken Burns's PBS documentary The Civil War.Each essay in Drawn With the Sword reveals McPherson's own profound knowledge of the Civil War and of the controversies among historians, presenting all sides in clear and lucid prose and concluding with his own measured and eloquent opinions. Readers will rejoice that McPherson has once againproven by example that history can be both accurate and interesting, informative and well-written. Mark Twain wrote that the Civil War "wrought so profoundly upon the entire national character that the influence cannot be measured short of two or three generations." In Drawn With the Sword,McPherson gracefully and brilliantly illuminates this momentous conflict.
| ISBN-13 | 9780195096798 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10 | 0195096797 |
| Weight | 1.06 Pounds |
| Dimensions | 8.82 x 5.92 x 0.94 In |
| List Price | $43.99 |
| Edition | 1st Edition |
| Format | Hardcover |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Pages | 272 pages |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press |
| Published On | 1996-04-18 |
View All Offers
Sort by:
Price
Condition
Seller
Seller Comments
Price
✨ Used, Like New
Seller details
Greenworld Books
Arlington, TX, USA
Excellent condition book with clean cover and pages. Barely handled with minimal wear. An outstandin...
Free delivery by: 05 Apr 2026
Used, Good
Seller details
Greenworld Books
Arlington, TX, USA
Good condition. It may show normal signs of use such as light writing highlighting or library markin...
Free delivery by: 05 Apr 2026
Used, Good
Seller details
Midtown Scholar Bookstore
Harrisburg, PA, USA
Some shelfwear/edgewear, may have remainder mark or previous owner's name-still NICE! Standard-sized...
Free delivery by: 05 Apr 2026
Used, Good
Seller details
Midtown Scholar Bookstore
Harrisburg, PA, USA
Some shelfwear/edgewear but still NICE! -may have remainder mark or previous owner's name Standard-s...
Free delivery by: 05 Apr 2026
Used, Very Good
Seller details
HPB-Ruby
Dallas, TX, USA
Connecting readers with great books since 1972! Used books may not include companion materials, and ...
Free delivery by: 05 Apr 2026