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A review by socraticgadfly
John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights by David S. Reynolds
dark
informative
reflective
slow-paced
3.75
Solid, fairly good, but not quite great.
Reynolds is very good on Brown the man in many ways, and not just Brown the abolitionist. He notes Brown as a totally inept businessman because of his general total rectitude on dealings and ineptitude on emerging modern capitalism.
On Brown as abolitionist, it's detailed about how it ran in the family, Brown's pre-Kansas work, his Kansas and post-Kansas work and of course Harper's Ferry.
It's possibly at its best on Brown the egalitarian. His including in his plan that a Black man should take the Frederick the Great sword of Lawrence Washington is one small gem here.
It's good on Brown's failures of imagination on Harper's Ferry, and also on him being totally sane. Behind that, it has a good look at Brown's "Secret Six" backers, and some of their ties to transcendentalism.
That said, Reynolds never speculates whether part of Brown's mind was hoping for a martyrdom failure just like he got. And, while some of the lies were to protect himself, he doesn't inquire about all of Brown's slips in rectitude over his Kansas actions. In other words, the bio is perhaps a bit too hagiographic at times.
Also, Puritans were in general NOT antinomian. Anne Hutchison et al lost the Antinomian Controversy, which is why many of them were booted out of Massachusetts Bay.
There's also minor errors scattered here and there. Pierce wasn't elected president in 1854. Kansas didn't become a state in 1858, though that was later corrected. And, not an error, but a few more pages here and there on what all else was happening in Kansas would have been nice.
And, on the national big picture? Reynolds eventually mentions Seward's "irrepresible conflict" near the end, as to why he didn't get the GOP nomination. Would have been better a couple hundred pages earlier, with first real discussion of Seward. Again, things like this tend to put one foot of the bio in hagiography.
Reynolds is very good on Brown the man in many ways, and not just Brown the abolitionist. He notes Brown as a totally inept businessman because of his general total rectitude on dealings and ineptitude on emerging modern capitalism.
On Brown as abolitionist, it's detailed about how it ran in the family, Brown's pre-Kansas work, his Kansas and post-Kansas work and of course Harper's Ferry.
It's possibly at its best on Brown the egalitarian. His including in his plan that a Black man should take the Frederick the Great sword of Lawrence Washington is one small gem here.
It's good on Brown's failures of imagination on Harper's Ferry, and also on him being totally sane. Behind that, it has a good look at Brown's "Secret Six" backers, and some of their ties to transcendentalism.
That said, Reynolds never speculates whether part of Brown's mind was hoping for a martyrdom failure just like he got. And, while some of the lies were to protect himself, he doesn't inquire about all of Brown's slips in rectitude over his Kansas actions. In other words, the bio is perhaps a bit too hagiographic at times.
Also, Puritans were in general NOT antinomian. Anne Hutchison et al lost the Antinomian Controversy, which is why many of them were booted out of Massachusetts Bay.
There's also minor errors scattered here and there. Pierce wasn't elected president in 1854. Kansas didn't become a state in 1858, though that was later corrected. And, not an error, but a few more pages here and there on what all else was happening in Kansas would have been nice.
And, on the national big picture? Reynolds eventually mentions Seward's "irrepresible conflict" near the end, as to why he didn't get the GOP nomination. Would have been better a couple hundred pages earlier, with first real discussion of Seward. Again, things like this tend to put one foot of the bio in hagiography.