UBC: Swanson
Swanson, James L. Manhunt: the 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer. New York: Harper Perennial: 2007.
This is a book that does admirably what it sets out to do. It is a fast-paced, compelling account of President Lincoln's assassination and the last twelve days of John Wilkes Booth's life. Swanson extrapolates from his primary evidence a little bit, to make a narrative out of disjointed testimony, but I don't think he ever goes quite as far as fictionalizing, and although I'm dubious about the reliability of the journalist George Alfred Townsend, whose at best secondhand account of the macabre journey of Booth's body Swanson seems to regard as eyewitness testimony, in general I think (given that I know absolutely nothing about either Lincoln or Booth scholarship) Swanson treats his sources fairly and with sympathy for everyone involved--even for the largely undeserving Booth. As with George Alfred Townsend, Swanson treats the memoir of Booth written by his sister Asia Booth Clarke as objectively reliable, even though the evidence of Booth's own writing shows that his sister, sadly championing, out of her own miserable situation, a dead and reviled underdog, was remembering him with all the benefits of nostalgia. Certainly the fact that Booth was a FLAMING RACIST NUTBALL was irrelevant to Asia Booth Clarke, and probably--in fairness to her--she didn't see the less attractive sides of his personality. Being a "Southern gentleman," he would have been careful not to show them to the ladies of his family. But Swanson's other evidence shows Booth to have been the apotheosis of the charismatic asshole: a breathtakingly self-unaware narcissist (Swanson quotes a splendidly horrifying letter to his mother in which, without even so much as a glimmer of an awareness of irony, he describes performing in the North during the war as being a slave); a man so fanatical about his white supremacist patriotism (regarding the Confederacy, not the Union, as his patria) that he sincerely believed he would be thanked and congratulated by both North and South for getting rid of Lincoln and was shocked, upon reading the newspapers, to discover that he was being reviled and anathematized instead; and a man, despite his ability to inspire others with devotion, with no loyalty to anyone save his own supremely importat self. It is possible to feel sorry for John Wilkes Booth, but it takes some doing.
Manhunt is certainly not, and does not pretend to be, a scholarly book, although Swanson does provide an extensive bibliography. The writing is mostly competent, and Swanson mostly manages not to get in his own way. I enjoyed it a great deal.
This is a book that does admirably what it sets out to do. It is a fast-paced, compelling account of President Lincoln's assassination and the last twelve days of John Wilkes Booth's life. Swanson extrapolates from his primary evidence a little bit, to make a narrative out of disjointed testimony, but I don't think he ever goes quite as far as fictionalizing, and although I'm dubious about the reliability of the journalist George Alfred Townsend, whose at best secondhand account of the macabre journey of Booth's body Swanson seems to regard as eyewitness testimony, in general I think (given that I know absolutely nothing about either Lincoln or Booth scholarship) Swanson treats his sources fairly and with sympathy for everyone involved--even for the largely undeserving Booth. As with George Alfred Townsend, Swanson treats the memoir of Booth written by his sister Asia Booth Clarke as objectively reliable, even though the evidence of Booth's own writing shows that his sister, sadly championing, out of her own miserable situation, a dead and reviled underdog, was remembering him with all the benefits of nostalgia. Certainly the fact that Booth was a FLAMING RACIST NUTBALL was irrelevant to Asia Booth Clarke, and probably--in fairness to her--she didn't see the less attractive sides of his personality. Being a "Southern gentleman," he would have been careful not to show them to the ladies of his family. But Swanson's other evidence shows Booth to have been the apotheosis of the charismatic asshole: a breathtakingly self-unaware narcissist (Swanson quotes a splendidly horrifying letter to his mother in which, without even so much as a glimmer of an awareness of irony, he describes performing in the North during the war as being a slave); a man so fanatical about his white supremacist patriotism (regarding the Confederacy, not the Union, as his patria) that he sincerely believed he would be thanked and congratulated by both North and South for getting rid of Lincoln and was shocked, upon reading the newspapers, to discover that he was being reviled and anathematized instead; and a man, despite his ability to inspire others with devotion, with no loyalty to anyone save his own supremely importat self. It is possible to feel sorry for John Wilkes Booth, but it takes some doing.
Manhunt is certainly not, and does not pretend to be, a scholarly book, although Swanson does provide an extensive bibliography. The writing is mostly competent, and Swanson mostly manages not to get in his own way. I enjoyed it a great deal.
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