Drawing on archives in the United States, England, and France, as well as unpublished Jefferson presidential papers, Meacham presents Jefferson as the most successful political leader of the early republic, and perhaps in all of American history. Jon Meacham lets us see Jefferson's world as Jefferson himself saw it, and to appreciate how Jefferson found the means to endure and win in the face of rife partisan division, economic uncertainty, and external threat. Passionate about many things-women, his family, books, science, architecture, gardens, friends, Monticello, and Paris-Jefferson loved America most, and he strove over and over again, despite fierce opposition, to realize his vision- the creation, survival, and success of popular government in America. Thomas Jefferson hated confrontation, and yet his understanding of power and of human nature enabled him to move men and to marshal ideas, to learn from his mistakes, and to prevail. Jefferson's genius was that he was both and could do both, often simultaneously.
Thomas Jefferson- The Art of Power gives us Jefferson the politician and president, a great and complex human being forever engaged in the wars of his era. Bloomberg Businessweek In this magnificent biography, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of American Lion and Franklin and Winston brings vividly to life an extraordinary man and his remarkable times. It is a must read for any serious biographer of Jefferson.NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review. This book is the first book-length attempt to flesh out and critically assess Jefferson's views on taste and the Fine Arts. An uncultivated imagination would severely impair ratiocination and moral sensitivity. Knowledge of such arts was indispensible because each person, thought Jefferson, was equipped with a faculty of taste as well as ratiocination and a moral-sense faculty-each of which required cultivation for human thriving. An educated person needed knowledge of architecture, gardening, painting, sculpture, rhetoric, belle lettres, poetry music, and criticism, considered as a sort of meta-art. Thus, education in the Fine Arts, which Jefferson listed as eight, was considered an indispensible part of the life of an educated person-especially a Virginian. Jefferson tended to classify the books of his libraries under the Baconian headings of memory, reason, and imagination, which corresponded to history, philosophy, and the fine arts.
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