This union of an iconoclastic historian and an icon-making series has produced a surprising, ultimately fulfilling match of author and age ... White's accomplishment in this thickly researched, energetically written, and at times mordantly funny book, is to find the newness and meaning in people and events that ... have been more familiar than understood.
Gregory Downs, Journal of ... Read moreAmerican History
Fearless and peerless, Richard White leads us through a transformed and fragmented nation in turmoil, haunted by the slain Abraham Lincoln, where visions of freedom and equality were rapidly vanishing. In the rural South, in the urban North, and out West, from the terribly destitute to the stupendously wealthy, White brings together stories that historians have long told separately, untangling the anger and blame that grew so deeply entrenched in the Gilded Age. How did all this happen? Richard White explains everything.
Martha Hodes, author of Mourning Lincoln
This splendid history from White (Railroaded), professor of American history at Stanford, reveals why the 30 years after the Civil War do not readily draw historians to them... White's great achievement is to capture the drabbest, least-redeeming three decades of American history with unimpeachable authority.
Publishers Weekly
This seminal work is essential reading on the history of the United States.
Library Review
In this monumental yet highly readable book, Mr. White has given us a panorama of an age that in many ways seems like our own. The volcanic turmoil of the late 19th century did much to shape the world that we live in today, with its creative and destructive cycles of industry, its quickening technological change, its extremes of wealth and poverty, its struggle to impose fairness in the jungle of the marketplace, its tug of war between freedom and regulation in the public interest. The Republic for Which It Stands is, in no small part, the story of how we came to be who we are.
The Wall Street Journal
The 10th entry in the series, covering the United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, may be the most erudite and sweeping of them all as well as among the most timely, reminding during a time of turmoil that the divisive tensions of race and class inequities, economic upheaval, and regional schisms have deep, tangled roots.
The Boston Globe
But most of all Mr White's book should be read - not just because it has so much to say about the latter part of the 19th century, but also because it casts light on America's current problems with giant companies and roiling populism.
Economist
There is almost nothing about the era that White fails to treat with intelligence and style... Richard White has related a decisive part of its history with stamina and skill.
The New York Times Book Review
The Republic for Which It Stands is a remarkably fresh and innovative way of looking at the Reconstruction and Gilded Age by an academic with unmatched academic credentials. No matter how much you have read on the Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, The Republic for Which It Stands has a lot to offer you. The Republic for Which It Stands should be a required part of any American history syllabus in all universities.
The Washington Book Review
[White] is one of the outstanding historians of his generation. It is difficult to think of many others who can match the range, depth, originality and influence of his writings, which include a prize-winning account of the construction of the transcontinental railroads, an environmental history of the Columbia River Valley, a general history of the American West, and even a memoir of his mothers life as an emigrant from Ireland. White is to be commended for assuming responsibility for this part of the series after more than one historical had abandoned it. His footnotes and bibliography reveal a remarkable command of the historical literature which he uses to construct a vast, sprawling and often original panorama of the American economy, politics and society between 1865 and 1896.
Times Literary Supplement
When questions of race, economic inequality, and the rise of giant corporate monopolies and a plutocratic elite dominate U.S. politics, it is time to take another look at Reconstruction and the Gilded Age...The rich history of those years (The Industrial Revolution) can be difficult to follow; readers will thank White for the clear prose and strong narrative drive that makes this complicated story easier to understand.
Foreign Affairs
(White) is one of the outstanding historians of his generation. It is difficult to think of many others who can match the range, depth, originality and influence of his writings.
Eric Foner, Times Literary Supplement
5
review. American history at its best.
Paul Donnelley, Express.co.uk
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