The Deadline: Essays [Paperback]

Jill Lepore is unquestionably one of Americas best historians; its fair to say shes one of its best writers too. Jonathan Russell Clark, Reading Lepore on the Second and 14th Amendments (any amendment, really) is elucidating. But its her inclinations toward misfits and old narratives we have taken for granted that make Jill Lepore is unquestionably one of Americas best historians; its fair to say shes one of its best writers too . . . Taken in sequentially, Lepores essays constitute a dizzying, entertaining and urgent survey course on contemporary American life. Although Lepore dives deep into the waters of bygone eras, she always writes from the present  the palpable surface of historys ever-rising tide. Lepore focuses her cogent insight on the most pressing issues of the past decade in American society, seamlessly moving between the intensely personal (a friend's cancer diagnosis) to the fiercely political (the urgent gun-violence crisis and ongoing debate over gun control) with authority and acumen . . . [ Bright, crisp, inventive, surprising, and a constant delight. [A] bracing and deeply considered guide to the ground-shifting cultural and political events of the past 10 years. Those for whom history is an incomprehensible nightmare may find relief reading the works of Jill Lepore... [she] writes with a distinct perspective and sophistication, with wisdom... Lepore's 46 essays include thoughts on her relationships with her father and mother, the latter's life told in parallel with an account of Jane Franklin, Ben Franklin's sister; literature (Frankenstein as a slave narrative, and the life of Herman Melville); America's history and its present (the life of Eugene Debs, the history of the U.S. Supreme Court, and an account of the torture regime of the Bush administration); and her love of biking. Her curiosity's intensity is matched only by its scope; the sheer variety of topics will surprise and delight readers who revel in the perhaps dying artlƒ