The Approaching Fury: Voices of the Storm, 1820-1861In the Approaching Fury: Voices of the Storm 1820-1861, biographer and historian Stephen B. Oates tells the story of the coming of the American Civil War through the voices and from the viewpoints of thirteen principal players in the drama, from Thomas Jefferson and Henry Clay in the Missouri crisis of 1820 down to Stephen A. Douglas, Jefferson Davis, and Abraham Lincoln in the final crisis of 1861. This unique approach shows the crucial role that perception of events played in the sectional hostilities that bore the United States irreversibly toward a national smashup. In addition to Jefferson, Clay, Douglas, Davis and Lincoln, other speakers and participants are Nat Turner, William Lloyd Garrison, John C. Calhoun, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Beecher Stowe, George Fitzhugh, John Brown, and Mary Boykin Chesnut. Each character takes his or her turn onstage, serving as narrator for critical events in which he or she was the major instigator and participant or eyewitness. In writing the dramatic monologues, Oates drew on the actual words of his speaker - their letter, speeches, interviews, recollection, and other recorded utterances - and then simulated how, if they were reminiscing aloud, they would describe the crucial events in which they were the principal actors or witnesses. All the events and themes in the monologues adhere to the actual historical record. |
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Page 216
... eye hadn't burst , you wrote on the slate , ' My wife saved it . " " Among my regular visitors was Senator Seward , the Republican leader , who kept me apprised of developments in Congress . As I lay in bed with the blindfold over my eyes ...
... eye hadn't burst , you wrote on the slate , ' My wife saved it . " " Among my regular visitors was Senator Seward , the Republican leader , who kept me apprised of developments in Congress . As I lay in bed with the blindfold over my eyes ...
Page 283
... eyes fierce like mine ; quiet , steady Owen , who would follow me anywhere ; and handsome young Watson , who had left a young wife and a newborn child in the Adirondacks , and sometimes woke me at night calling out to them . The oldest ...
... eyes fierce like mine ; quiet , steady Owen , who would follow me anywhere ; and handsome young Watson , who had left a young wife and a newborn child in the Adirondacks , and sometimes woke me at night calling out to them . The oldest ...
Page 352
... eyes , and a weather - beaten face , Crittenden had served off and on in the Senate since 1817 , and he beseeched me to help him forge a com- promise to ward off secession . I did not see how the Senate could accomplish anything now ...
... eyes , and a weather - beaten face , Crittenden had served off and on in the Senate since 1817 , and he beseeched me to help him forge a com- promise to ward off secession . I did not see how the Senate could accomplish anything now ...
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