Mr. Lincoln Sits for His Portrait

December 5, 2022
Using a wider lens than its title indicates, this trim, information-packed volume examines Abraham Lincoln, from pre-presidential days to his assassination, as a skillful image-builder who sought to “let photographic portrayals represent him as a man of strength, conviction, humility, and compassion.” Proposing that Lincoln was “shrewd and deeply purposeful” in relying on new technologies, photography included, to advance his political career and, as president, gain support for initiatives, Marcus (You Can’t Say That!) details the circumstances behind and creation of several photographs that take Lincoln as their subject, as well as Francis Bicknell Carpenter’s well-known painting, First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln. As the narrative builds toward Feb. 9, 1864—the day that Anthony Berger captured the titular photograph of Lincoln reading to youngest son Tad—smoothly inserted digressions discuss topics such as the history of photography. Written in an accessible tone, peppered with warm anecdotes, and brimming with historical images enhanced by explicatory captions, this is an intriguing, well-researched look at 19th-century politics and presentation as exemplified by Lincoln. Numerous enriching timelines and sidebars appear throughout. Ages 10–12.

Starred review from December 1, 2022
A provocative study of Abraham Lincoln as a masterly media manipulator. Infusing his typically clear and well-reasoned discourse with modern-sounding language, Marcus presents Lincoln as an early adopter of new technology, being one of the first public figures to understand the power of photography and who "loved the camera" enough to leave over 100 surviving portraits. Based on a broad array of period illustrations, looking at six iconic photos taken in Matthew Brady's Washington, D.C., studio on Feb. 9, 1864 (and, in greater focus, at one in particular), he offers a visually based overview of the 16th president's political career--from the earliest likeness in 1846 and an 1860 Brady shot that boosted his first national campaign by going "viral" both as a carte de visite and "morphed" into a line engraving for Harper's Weekly--on to post-assassination memorial images. (The author makes no mention of various and possibly spurious deathbed photos.) Aside from confusingly characterizing the Emancipation Proclamation as "a watershed moment in human history" a few pages after dubbing it just "a symbolic statement" like the finishing of the Capitol's dome, Marcus offers readers deeply enlightening views of presidential achievements and daily routines, of the era's unfinished and chaotic Washington, D.C., and of Brady and other artists who depicted the president in various media. Everyone in the pictures is White except in occasional racially mixed engravings of crowd scenes. A fresh angle offering yet another reason to regard Lincoln as our presidential G.O.A.T. (timelines, bibliography, notes, photo credits, index) (Biography. 11-14)

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Starred review from February 1, 2023
Grades 4-7 *Starred Review* It's become iconographic, the famous photographic portrait of President Abraham Lincoln reading to his then 10-year-old son, the mischievous Tad. Taken on February 9, 1864, it shows Lincoln seated in profile facing right with Tad standing by his father's left arm. Lincoln is wearing his reading glasses (a unique touch) and balancing a large book on his knee. Most viewers incorrectly presumed the book was the Family Bible; it was, instead, a Brady catalog. The indefatigable Marcus uses the photograph and the occasion of its being taken as a jumping off point for this fascinating, anecdote-rich profile of the sixteenth president. It turns out, Marcus asserts, that Lincoln loved the camera. From his first portrait in 1846 or 1847 to 1865, more than 100 followed, a generous handful of which are reproduced along with many other archival photographs in this handsome book. Indeed, Lincoln was among the first public figures to use photographs to present himself. They portrayed a man whose enemies cruelly likened to a great baboon; Lincoln himself regarded his visage self-deprecatingly, while a contemporary artist hauntingly described the face as being "the saddest I ever knew." Marcus' latest is exceedingly well written and unfailingly interesting, bringing Lincoln into vivid focus. The book will be useful in the classroom, of course, but is even better for independent reading.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.