What do you think?
Rate this book
Marse Henry
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
170 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1974
2 people are currently reading
4 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
June 12, 2021
Henry Watterson (1840-1921) brought out this autobiography in two substantial volumes just two years before his death.
“I have been all my life a Constitutional Nationalist; first the nation, then the state.” (Vol. 2, p. 127) Yet he fought in the Confederate Army and decades later would describe himself as a “ragged old rebel”; his reasoning for this departure seems vague and unconvincing. (He invariably called the war the War of Sections.) He had a cheerful and rather touching disregard for such contradictions in his opinions and in himself, since he had the highest confidence in both.
He seemingly knew everybody of consequence in American politics and beyond and took very decided positions on all manner of subjects—Henry Adams, Paris, Stephen Foster, tariffs, the arts, monetary policy, Artemus Ward, feminism (most definitely not a fan), on and on. "Upon the appearance of the proposed League of Nations I made bold to challenge it, as but a pretty conceit having no real value, a serious assault upon our national sovereignty." (Vol. 2, p. 275) His “spats,” as he calls them, with Grover Cleveland form a multi-page mini-melodrama, with rodomontade from both parties in spades.
To get anywhere near the most from this book, one needs to have an extraordinarily good working background of his times, places, persons, and events. He assumes that his readers will have such. Since his own knowledge and experience was so wide, I wonder how true that was even among many of his reasonably educated contemporaries.
Before its appearance in book form, this autobiography appeared in serial form in the Saturday Evening Post; this accounts for its somewhat disparate and disjointed presentation. If its many pages seem daunting, Googling “marse henry summary” will yield summaries from Documenting the American South.
“I have been all my life a Constitutional Nationalist; first the nation, then the state.” (Vol. 2, p. 127) Yet he fought in the Confederate Army and decades later would describe himself as a “ragged old rebel”; his reasoning for this departure seems vague and unconvincing. (He invariably called the war the War of Sections.) He had a cheerful and rather touching disregard for such contradictions in his opinions and in himself, since he had the highest confidence in both.
He seemingly knew everybody of consequence in American politics and beyond and took very decided positions on all manner of subjects—Henry Adams, Paris, Stephen Foster, tariffs, the arts, monetary policy, Artemus Ward, feminism (most definitely not a fan), on and on. "Upon the appearance of the proposed League of Nations I made bold to challenge it, as but a pretty conceit having no real value, a serious assault upon our national sovereignty." (Vol. 2, p. 275) His “spats,” as he calls them, with Grover Cleveland form a multi-page mini-melodrama, with rodomontade from both parties in spades.
To get anywhere near the most from this book, one needs to have an extraordinarily good working background of his times, places, persons, and events. He assumes that his readers will have such. Since his own knowledge and experience was so wide, I wonder how true that was even among many of his reasonably educated contemporaries.
Before its appearance in book form, this autobiography appeared in serial form in the Saturday Evening Post; this accounts for its somewhat disparate and disjointed presentation. If its many pages seem daunting, Googling “marse henry summary” will yield summaries from Documenting the American South.
Displaying 1 of 1 review