Gore Vidal "Lincoln" Signed Limited Edition, Leather-Bound w/COA [Sealed]

Personally signed by Gore Vidal, the American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit. 

Easton Press. Norwalk, CT. 2000. Gore Vidal "Lincoln" Signed Limited Edition. Luxuriously bound with full genuine leather. No dust jacket as issued. All edges gilt. Includes unattached bookplate. Includes COA and collector's notes by the publisher. 657 pages. Sealed without any flaws. 

Lincoln (1984) is a historical novel by Gore Vidal that portrays Abraham Lincoln as a complex political figure, focusing on his presidency during the Civil War rather than a hagiographic account. The book, part of Vidal's Narratives of Empire series, explores Lincoln's personal struggles, political maneuvering, and the immense burdens of preserving the Union, often through the eyes of other historical figures like his wife Mary Todd Lincoln and his secretaries. It presents him as a pragmatic, sometimes ruthless, politician who evolved on issues like slavery, ultimately transforming the nation in his image.

Key aspects of the novel

Perspective: While Lincoln is the central figure, the story is narrated by various historical characters, giving a multi-faceted view of him.

Themes: It delves into Lincoln's political genius, his personal grief (especially the loss of his son), his difficult marriage, and the immense pressure of the war.

Characterization: Vidal portrays Lincoln not as a plaster saint, but as a shrewd, ambitious, and sometimes calculating politician who used his folksy image ("Honest Abe") as a tool.

Scope: The novel covers his presidency from his arrival in Washington in disguise before his inauguration to his assassination, examining how he navigated a disintegrating nation.
Historical context: It is set within Vidal's larger fictional history of the United States, positioning Lincoln as a pivotal figure who fundamentally reshaped the country.

Features

Contains all the classic Easton Press qualities:

* Premium Leather
* Silk Moire Endleaves
* Distinctive Cover Design
* Hubbed Spine, Accented in Real 22KT Gold
* Satin Ribbon Page Marker
* Gilded Page Edges
* Long-lasting, High Quality Acid-neutral Paper
* Smyth-sewn Pages for Strength and Durability
* Beautiful Illustrations

Gore Vidal 

Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit. His novels and essays interrogated the social and cultural sexual norms he perceived as driving American life. Beyond literature, Vidal was heavily involved in politics. He unsuccessfully sought office twice as a Democratic Party candidate, first in 1960 to the U.S. House of Representatives (for New York), and later in 1982 to the U.S. Senate (for California).

A grandson of a U.S. Senator, Vidal was born into an upper-class political family. As a political commentator and essayist, Vidal's primary focus was the history and society of the United States, especially how a militaristic foreign policy reduced the country to a decadent empire. His political and cultural essays were published in The Nation, the New Statesman, the New York Review of Books, and Esquire magazines. As a public intellectual, Gore Vidal's topical debates on sex, politics, and religion with other intellectuals and writers occasionally turned into quarrels with the likes of William F. Buckley Jr. and Norman Mailer.

As a novelist, Vidal explored the nature of corruption in public and private life. His style of narration evoked the time and place of his stories, and delineated the psychology of his characters. His third novel, The City and the Pillar (1948), offended the literary, political, and moral sensibilities of conservative book reviewers, the plot being about a dispassionately presented male homosexual relationship. In the historical novel genre, Vidal recreated the imperial world of Julian the Apostate (r. AD 361–363) in Julian (1964). Julian was the Roman emperor who attempted to re-establish Roman polytheism to counter Christianity.[4] In social satire, Myra Breckinridge (1968) explores the mutability of gender roles and sexual orientation as being social constructs established by social mores.[5]: 94–100  In Burr (1973) and Lincoln (1984), each protagonist is presented as "A Man of the People" and as "A Man" in a narrative exploration of how the public and private facets of personality affect the national politics of the United States.

Vidal c. 1948