Best Biographies

Updated July 24, 2023
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The new Negro : the life of Alain Locke
Stewart, Jeffrey C.
Paper Book
Winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for BiographyA tiny, fastidiously dressed man emerged from Black Philadelphia around the turn of the century to mentor a generation of young artists including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Jacob Lawrence and call them the New Negro - the creative African...
Frederick Douglass : prophet of freedom
Blight, David W.
Paper Book
**Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History** "Extraordinary...a great American biography" (The New Yorker) of the most important African American of the 19th century: Frederick Douglass, the escaped slave who became the greatest orator of his day and one of the leading...
The Hemingses of Monticello : an American family
Gordon-Reed, Annette
Paper Book
This epic work tells the story of the Hemingses, a slave family whose close blood ties to American president Thomas Jefferson had been systematically edited out from American history until very recently. This book sets the family's compelling saga against the backdrop of Revolutionary America,...
W.E.B. DuBois--biography of a race, 1868-1919
Lewis, David L.
Paper Book
A literate, meticulously researched biography of the complex scholar/activist DuBois, premier architect of the civil rights movement in the United States. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Alexander Hamilton
Chernow, Ron.
Paper Book
The #1 New York Times bestseller, and the inspiration for the hit Broadway musical Hamilton! Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ron Chernow presents a landmark biography of Alexander Hamilton, the Founding Father who galvanized, inspired, scandalized, and shaped the newborn...
Unbroken : a World War II story of survival, resilience, and redemption
Hillenbrand, Laura
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The incredible true story of survival and salvation that is the basis for two major motion pictures: Unbroken and Unbroken: Path to Redemption. "Extraordinarily moving . . . a powerfully drawn survival epic."--The Wall Street...
Team of rivals : the political genius of Abraham Lincoln
Goodwin, Doris Kearns
Paper Book
A New York Times Bestseller -- Basis for the movie Lincoln On May 18, 1860, William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and Abraham Lincoln waited for the results from the Republican National Convention. Lincoln won, Goodwin demonstrates, because of his extraordinary ability to put himself in...

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