Was Lincoln the 'Great Emancipator', whose wartime leadership helped free four million enslaved people? Or was he a nationalist who jumped late on the antislavery bandwagon? Was his intransigence the cause of much bloodshed? Or was he a pragmatist whose leadership minimised the destruction of the war?.
This concise biography situates Lincoln in his time and place. A very human figure who, after his assassination by a leading Shakespearean actor, was turned into an icon.