| Edition |
1st Vintage books ed. |
| Description |
333 pages, [1] folded leaf of plates : illustrations (some color), portraits ; 21 cm |
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text txt rdacontent |
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unmediated n rdamedia |
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volume nc rdacarrier |
| Note |
Originally published: 1st ed. New York : Knopf, 1991. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 327-333). |
| Contents |
pt. 1. The many deaths of General Wolfe. At the face of the cliff -- In command -- Deep in the forest -- On the heights of Abraham -- pt. 2. Death of a Harvard man. Honest sweat : the blacksmith's son -- Income : the pedestrian -- Enterprise : the janitor -- Debt : skyrocket Jack -- Taking stock : the prisoner and the public -- Accounts rendered : lawyers, doctors and other solid citizens -- Payment pending : the press, the preachers and the prisoner -- Settlements : the legatees. |
| Summary |
This book goes beyond more conventional histories to address the deeper enigmas that confront a student of the past. In order to do so, the author reconstructs--and at times reinvents--two ambiguous deaths: the first, that of General James Wolfe at the battle of Quebec in 1759; the second, in 1849, that of George Parkman, an eccentric Boston brahmin whose murder by an impecunious Harvard professor in 1849 was a grisly reproach to the moral sanctity of his society. Out of these stories--with all of their bizarre coincidences and contradictions--the author creates a vital work of historical imagination. |
| Subject |
Boston (Mass.) -- Biography.
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Wolfe, James, 1727-1759 -- Death and burial.
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Parkman, Francis, 1823-1893 -- Death and burial.
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Parkman, George, 1790-1849 -- Death and burial.
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Death -- Social aspects -- Massachusetts -- Boston -- History.
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| ISBN |
0679736131 (pbk.) |
|
9780679736134 (pbk.) |
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