Lincoln the Man (Unabridged‪)‬

Whenever the subject of Lincoln is brought up, it usually produces a mixed response ranging from adoration to excoriation. Back in 1931 when Lincoln the Man appeared, there were few willing to publicly judge Lincoln on the basis of anything less than hagiographic platitudes. That all changed when the famous poet and writer Edgar Lee Masters published Lincoln the Man. Masters grew to manhood in the same Illinois county where Lincoln also grew up and practiced law. His family knew Lincoln well from his earliest days, and they followed his entire career with interest and rising concern. This book is less a biography and more of an analysis of Lincoln’s thinking process and political evolution from backwoods lawyer to president of the United States. 

Edgar Lee Masters was born in 1868. He led a successful career as a lawyer in partnership with Clarence Darrow. But it was the publication of his brilliant poetry collection Spoon River Anthology in 1915 which made him famous. Masters would go on to produce 52 other poetry collections, novels, essays, and plays. He died in New York City in 1950 and was buried in Petersburg, Illinois.