From Pulitzer Prize-winning author and esteemed presidential historian
Doris Kearns Goodwin, an invaluable guide to the development and
exercise of leadership from Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Lyndon
B. Johnson, and Franklin D. Roosevelt.
The inspiration for the multipart HISTORY Channel series Abraham
Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt.
"After five decades of magisterial output, Doris Kearns Goodwin leads
the league of presidential historians" (USA TODAY). In her "inspiring"
(The Christian Science Monitor) Leadership, Doris Kearns Goodwin
draws upon the four presidents she has studied most closely--Abraham
Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B.
Johnson (in civil rights)--to show how they recognized leadership
qualities within themselves and were recognized as leaders by others. By
looking back to their first entries into public life, we encounter them
at a time when their paths were filled with confusion, fear, and hope.
Leadership tells the story of how they all collided with dramatic
reversals that disrupted their lives and threatened to shatter forever
their ambitions. Nonetheless, they all emerged fitted to confront the
contours and dilemmas of their times. At their best, all four were
guided by a sense of moral purpose. At moments of great challenge, they
were able to summon their talents to enlarge the opportunities and lives
of others. Does the leader make the times or do the times make the
leader?
"If ever our nation needed a short course on presidential leadership, it
is now" (The Seattle Times). This seminal work provides an accessible
and essential road map for aspiring and established leaders in every
field. In today's polarized world, these stories of authentic leadership
in times of apprehension and fracture take on a singular urgency.
"Goodwin's volume deserves much praise--it is insightful, readable,
compelling: Her book arrives just in time" (The Boston Globe).
