Theodore Roosevelt: A Biography

Henry F. Pringle's Pulitzer Prize biography of Theodore Roosevelt is an important and durable contribution to Rooseveltian literature. Not only does it chronicle the incidents that shaped Roosevelt's career but it offers insight into the character and mind of this colorful American president as well. A childhood illness, asthma, may have played a role in shaping his political personality. Teased and taunted for his physical weakness, Roosevelt compensated for this and other humiliations by taking up boxing, leading the Rough Riders, brandishing the Big Stick, and hunting lions. T.R. remarked that the presidency was a "bully pulpit," and he preached on such topics as art, literature, nature, football, marriage, childrearing, and birth control. He relished the controversies that his words incited, and when public opinion was against him, he retreated by speaking out on a different subject. As the author states in his forward, "Theodore Roosevelt" was never dull.