Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Roy Jenkins
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Roy Jenkins
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Franklin Delano Roosevelt
The American Presidents Series: The 32nd President, 1933-1945

Author: Roy Jenkins

Narrator: Richard Rohan

Abridged: 2 hr 56 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/01/2004

Synopsis

A masterly, posthumous work by the New York Times bestselling author of Churchill and Gladstone

A protean figure and a man of massive achievement, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the only man to be elected to the presidency more than twice. In a ranking of chief executives, no more than three of his predecessors could truly be placed in contention with his standing, and of his successors, there are so far none.

In acute, stylish language, Roy Jenkins tackles all of the nuances and intricacies of FDR's character. He was a skilled politician with astounding flexibility; he oversaw an incomparable mobilization of American industrial and military effort; and all the while aroused great loyalty and dazzled those around him with his personal charm. Despite several setbacks and one apparent catastrophe, his life was buoyed by the influence of Eleanor, who was not only a wife but an adviser and one of the twentieth century's greatest political reformers.

Nearly complete before Jenkins's death in January 2003, this volume was finished by historian Richard Neustadt.

About Roy Jenkins

Roy Jenkins was the author of twenty-one books, including the New York Times bestsellers Churchill and Gladstone, the latter of which won the Whitbread Prize for Biography. Active in British politics for half a century, he entered the House of Commons as a Labour member in 1948 and subsequently served as minister of aviation, home secretary, and chancellor of the Exchequer. In 1977—81 he was president of the European Commission. In 1987 he became chancellor of Oxford University and took his seat in the House of Lords as Lord Jenkins of Hill head. He also served as president of the Royal Society of Literature.

About Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., (1917-2007) was the preeminent political historian of our time. For more than half a century, he was a cornerstone figure in the intellectual life of the nation and a fixture on the political scene. He won two Pulitzer prizes for The Age of Jackson (1946) and A Thousand Days (1966), and in 1988 received the National Humanities Medal. He published the first volume of his autobiography, A Life in the Twentieth Century, in 2000.

About Richard Rohan

Richard Rohan has been a stage, film, and voiceover actor for the past twenty years.  He has narrated hundreds of audiobooks, in every genre, and was awarded the 2003 Audie Award winner for Nonfiction and the 2008 Best Voice in Science Fiction & Fantasy by AudioFile magazine. He directed and performed on the acclaimed Space Fantasy audio drama series Deathstalker. Rohan can also be heard on Macmillan Audio's historical series, The American Presidents.

Reviews

Goodreads review by David on May 23, 2010

I love FDR. Of course. He was the O.G. of socialist U.S. presidents. (It's a lucky thing that the Tea Party set has no cultural memory -- one of the many qualities of which they are deficient.) Sure, FDR fucked up now and again -- as with his foolish attempt to enlarge the Supreme Court by several m......more

Goodreads review by robin on August 21, 2024

Franklin D. Roosevelt In The American Presidents Series Over the years, I have learned a great deal about American history and about the presidency from the American Presidents Series. Founded by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., the series currently includes short, accessible biographies of each former Ameri......more

Goodreads review by Ben on October 19, 2019

Franklin Delano Roosevelt is the thirtieth-first book in The American Presidents series – a biographical series chronicling the Presidents of the United States. Roy Jenkins wrote this particular installment, completed by Richard E. Neustadt, and edited by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. Franklin Delano Ro......more

Goodreads review by Julie on December 31, 2020

I shouldn't have stuck with this book as long as I did, but I hate giving up on a book. There are too many good books to stick with one I really don't like, but I stuck with this one. I suppose the book itself is OK, but it's just not my type of book. It's written in a way that made me feel like I w......more

Goodreads review by Allan on April 14, 2017

A brief overview of FDR's path to the presidency and his continuing impact on the world. This was the book that Jenkins was working on at the time of his death. The last section was completed by his friend Richard Neusdadt. Ironically, this was about Roosevelt's declining health. As ever with Jenkins......more

Quotes

"Elegantly describing FDR's course through a score of personal and political ordeals, Jenkins astutely shows us the man in all his many incarnations: the confident son of privilege who morphed into a wry, young politico on the rise; the startled victim, for whom all things had previously come so easily, hitting the brick wall of polio and fighting back, strenuously leading his broken country out of its two great 20th-century crises: the Great Depression and World War II. " - Publishers Weekly

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