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Burr GORE VIDAL 9780434829606 Books

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Burr GORE VIDAL 9780434829606 Books

Gore Vidal's "Burr: A Novel" represents the best type of historical fiction. Vidal does not bind himself to historical fact except where it enhances the narrative, at times moving people through time or space to better his story, but using the dynamism of the history he describes to drive his tale. He even creates a fictional protagonist, Charles Schuyler (not of the Schuylers into whose family Alexander Hamilton married), in order to allow him access to the object of his focus. Though Vidal appears to attempt a rehabilitation of Aaron Burr's reputation, he describes him as "a monster, in short" (pg. 4). Vidal's descriptions of Burr return continuously to diabolic imagery. He writes, "Aaron Burr <i>has</i> made an arrangement with the devil. Every dark legend is true" (pg. 69). Vidal's Burr continually reclines near a fire, unable to stay warm even in summer. Vidal's protagonist writes of Washington City, "If this is not Hell, it will do. I have never been so hot. I can see why Colonel Burr wanted to be president - to revel in the stifling, damp heat of this depressing tropical swamp" (pg. 409). Even his desire to keep his word evokes Milton's Lucifer. Vidal writes, "In politics, as in life, one ought to do what one has promised to do. This has been my Quixotic code" (pg. 194). This foreshadows the concept of honor that historian Joanne B. Freeman later argued prevented Burr from dropping his campaign for the presidency when he tied with Jefferson in 1800. Despite these literary touches, Vidal delights in accurately describing individuals as they might have appeared to Burr as well as the locations in which they worked and lived. He even tells the story of Helen Jewett, who had faded from notoriety by the 1970s and would not experience a resurgence of popular interest until Patricia Cline Cohen's 1999 biography. Historians, both professional and casual, of the colonial and early Republic periods will find much to enjoy in this novel.


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Burr GORE VIDAL 9780434829606 Books Reviews

Chronologically, this is the first in Gore Vidal's epic series spanning American history though two centuries.
History is written by the "winners", so it is fresh to see the events trough cynical fictional glasses. It is hard to imagine
someone so far on the way up in U. S. politics falling so far down. There is Nixon, of course. Then all the recent sex scandals involving candidates.

But what is the story behind Burr? Treason, or was he "had"?. It still goes on for anyone who has read the Man Without a Country."

The bitterness must be there. He killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel. Years later in the novel he visits the monument to Hamilton erected on the "sacred" spot decorated by pigeon droppings. He muses about if the duel had gone the other way, then the bastard from the islands would be forgotten and penniless, and Aaron Burr would be the hero. Could be.

A fun read for history buffs.
Burr was my first introduction to Gore Vidal's panoramic vision of American history, and I have to admit that the first time I picked up the book I drifted off and put it down, disappointed by the early focus on elderly Aaron Burr's marriage to a wealthy widow. I wanted an inside account (albeit fictionalized) of the revolutionary years, intimate portraits of men like Jefferson, Washington, Arnold and Hamilton, as well as accounts of the famous duel and Burr's subsuquent political travails and treason trial.
Alas, I should have given the book a little more time. When it picks up and the mythical autobiographical journal of Burr begins, this novel becomes entertainment of the highest order. Burr, through Vidal, writes a wickedly amusing first-hand account of many of the seminal points in our nation's young history, from the winter at Valley Forge to Benedict Arnold's early success as a general. In telling his story, Burr never passes up an opportunity to point out George Washington's ineptitude as a field general or his plumpness, Jefferson's lack of military duty and his resemblance to the mulatto children living at Monticello, Ethan Allen's lack of popularity with his superiors, etc. Nobody is spared, nothing is sacred in a Gore Vidal novel.
As for the historical accuracy, Vidal points out in an afterword that with a couple of very minor anachronisms (which he details), every character in the book acts as he or she did in real life - their speech and writings are borrowed from actual correspondence, and the historical events depicted are painstakingly researched (Vidal took 10 years to write the book). Even narrator Charlie Schuyler's girlfriend, the prostitute Helen Jewitt, is based upon a real life character. So while some graduate students might object to a phrase or two, and perhaps some Jeffersonians will object to the two-faced opportunist Jefferson portrayed here, for most of us with a casual interest in history the book educates as it entertains.
Gore Vidal's "Burr A Novel" represents the best type of historical fiction. Vidal does not bind himself to historical fact except where it enhances the narrative, at times moving people through time or space to better his story, but using the dynamism of the history he describes to drive his tale. He even creates a fictional protagonist, Charles Schuyler (not of the Schuylers into whose family Alexander Hamilton married), in order to allow him access to the object of his focus. Though Vidal appears to attempt a rehabilitation of Aaron Burr's reputation, he describes him as "a monster, in short" (pg. 4). Vidal's descriptions of Burr return continuously to diabolic imagery. He writes, "Aaron Burr <i>has</i> made an arrangement with the devil. Every dark legend is true" (pg. 69). Vidal's Burr continually reclines near a fire, unable to stay warm even in summer. Vidal's protagonist writes of Washington City, "If this is not Hell, it will do. I have never been so hot. I can see why Colonel Burr wanted to be president - to revel in the stifling, damp heat of this depressing tropical swamp" (pg. 409). Even his desire to keep his word evokes Milton's Lucifer. Vidal writes, "In politics, as in life, one ought to do what one has promised to do. This has been my Quixotic code" (pg. 194). This foreshadows the concept of honor that historian Joanne B. Freeman later argued prevented Burr from dropping his campaign for the presidency when he tied with Jefferson in 1800. Despite these literary touches, Vidal delights in accurately describing individuals as they might have appeared to Burr as well as the locations in which they worked and lived. He even tells the story of Helen Jewett, who had faded from notoriety by the 1970s and would not experience a resurgence of popular interest until Patricia Cline Cohen's 1999 biography. Historians, both professional and casual, of the colonial and early Republic periods will find much to enjoy in this novel.