Review by Choice Review
This historical biography of the last decade of the separate lives of John Hay and Mark Twain as well as their friendship coincides with the period of the rise of American imperialism. The book is very well written and organized, as the narrative across 45 chapters shifts seamlessly back and forth between the lives of the statesman (Hayes) and the storyteller (Twain), as they were affected by and affected the rise of American imperialism. Both personalities were centrally involved in this seminal period of American history from the end of the 19th century into the early 20th century. The book ends with acknowledgments and a note on methods and sources. There is no conclusion that might have clarified or synthesized how the two selected personalities and their interaction add to the existing literature on the rise of American imperialism. The lack of such a conclusion limits the usefulness of the book for scholars but does not detract from the benefit general readers can gain from the narrative. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers. --Michael A. Morris, Clemson University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* When Mark Twain praised the poetry of John Hay private secretary to Lincoln and secretary of state under McKinley and Roosevelt Hay informed Twain that his laudatory words left him comfortable beyond measure. However, as Zwonitzer probes the long-lived relationship between these two titans of post-Civil War America, readers repeatedly see episodes taut with tension. Like the novelist, the cabinet secretary started his ascent into prominence from a hardscrabble town on the Mississippi. His origins thus gave Hay a poetic vernacular that Twain valued. But even as their commonalities drew the men together, Mrs. Hay poured Methodist censure on their masculine banter. More seriously testing their bond during the decade of primary interest to Zwonitzer, Hay served as the willing agent of presidents intent on global expansion, while Twain vehemently decried the brutal tactics of the American imperialists. Fascinated readers will marvel at how mutual regard sustained the tie between Hay and Twain, so fully that in a 1900 letter Hays identified his friendship with Twain as a most precious possession, and four years later Twain found deep comfort in the condolences Hay extended upon the death of Twain's wife. A compelling narrative, opening rare insight into an exceptional friendship played out in the shadow of epoch-making geopolitics.--Christensen, Bryce Copyright 2016 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Documentarian Zwonitzer examines the split in an otherwise warm acquaintance between John Hay-an aide to Abraham Lincoln before becoming his secretary of state-and Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain), in this puzzlingly conceived account. The relationship between the two cooled around 1900 over America's imperialist war in the Philippines, which Hay, as senior American statesman, helped direct for presidents McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Clemens concluded that the U.S. had gone too far in trying to defeat the Philippine rebels and went public with his criticism. Unfortunately, that's weak scaffolding for a book, and as winningly as Zwonitzer unfolds the tale, it's really a parallel biography of two men whose lives scarcely interacted in significant ways. Given Zwonitzer's interest in the Spanish-American War, his focus should have been on Hay, who has recently been the subject of John Taliaferro's fine biography All the Great Prizes. Clemens, while brilliantly described, seems an afterthought and incidental to the main action. What Zwonitzer accomplishes is adding novelistic color to his rendering of both men in their years of friendship. Zwonitzer makes all of his subjects here spring alive, and the book is a delightful read, even if the central conceit doesn't fully work. Agent: Philippa Brophy, Sterling Lord Literistic. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
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Review by Library Journal Review
Zwonitzer (coauthor, Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?) presents, in a lengthy narrative framework, little-known facts about two relatively well-known men-John Hay, ambassador to the UK and subsequently secretary of state, and Mark Twain, author and cultural critic-focusing on the last years of their lives, 1895-1905. On a friendly basis through occasional correspondence for 38 years, the two men lived parallel lives that rarely intersected physically, despite Twain's onetime offers to partner and travel with Hay. Even when both resided in London during Hay's period as ambassador, they maintained their distance, reflecting their opposing roles in society, one as an official representative and the other as a professional contrarian. Differing in personality (though both originally from the frontier Midwest) and viewpoint (especially after America's expansion in the 20th century), they and their families combatted recurrent physical ailments, which the author details in depth. VERDICT Readers will appreciate learning about the contextualized experiences of these exemplars of the literary and diplomatic classes of their time. Those further interested in America's international military and commercial roles would also benefit from Philip McFarland's Mark Twain and the Colonel.-Frederick J. Augustyn Jr., Lib. of Congress, Washington, DC © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
American politics revealed through the lives of two indelible figures. Documentary film producer and writer Zwonitzer (co-author: Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?: The Carter Family and Their Legacy in American Music, 2002) plies his considerable talent at storytelling in this vivid dual biography of statesman John Hay (1838-1905) and 19th-century America's most famous writer, Mark Twain (1835-1910). The author's choice of these two men seems somewhat arbitrary: although both grew up in "remote and brutish Mississippi River towns," their relationship "was not one of great intimacy and was even a tad distant." After they met in the 1860s, they rarely saw one another. Temperamentally, Zwonitzer notes, they were "very different sorts of men." Hay was refined and diplomatic and had married into significant wealth. Twain, volatile and impetuous, was dogged by debt. They differed politically, too: Hay, who had been Lincoln's secretary, was "a Republican in the original party sense: a defender of government by educated and accomplished white men"; Twain "was a small-d-democrat and skeptical that anybody in power would long remain interested in the common good." From 1895 to 1905, Hay was involved most directly in the country's transformation as ambassador to England and secretary of state under William McKinley and, after McKinley's assassination, Theodore Roosevelt. In 1898, America engaged in war with Spain over Cuba; Spain capitulated after a few weeks, ceding the Philippines to the U.S. The annexation of Hawaii soon followed. Hay's negotiations with British and European leaders put him in the center of world affairs. But "Hay needed no office in order to wield influence," his friend Henry Adams commented. "For him, influence lay about the streets, waiting for him to stoop to it." Because Twain's waning years are well-knowntireless efforts to earn money, sadness over the deaths of two daughters and his wifeHay emerges as the fresher figure in Zwonitzer's pages. A brisk and entertaining historical narrative. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
