“Heartachingly relevant…the Eleanor Roosevelt who inhabits
these meticulously crafted pages transcends both first-lady history
and the marriage around which Roosevelt scholarship has traditionally
pivoted.” — The Wall Street Journal
The final volume
in the definitive biography of America’s greatest first lady.
“Monumental
and inspirational…Cook skillfully narrates the epic history of the
war years… [a] grand biography.” — The New York Times Book
Review
Historians, politicians, critics, and readers everywhere have praised
Blanche Wiesen Cook’s biography of Eleanor Roosevelt as the
essential portrait of a woman who towers over the twentieth century.
The third and final volume takes us through World War II, FDR’s
death, the founding of the UN, and Eleanor Roosevelt’s death in
1962. It follows the arc of war and the evolution of a marriage, as
the first lady realized the cost of maintaining her principles even
as the country and her husband were not prepared to adopt them.
Eleanor Roosevelt continued to struggle for her core issues—economic
security, New Deal reforms, racial equality, and rescue—when they
were sidelined by FDR while he marshaled the country through war. The
chasm between Eleanor and Franklin grew, and the strains on their
relationship were as political as they were personal. She also had to
negotiate the fractures in the close circle of influential women
around her at Val-Kill, but through it she gained confidence in her
own vision, even when forced to amend her agenda when her beliefs
clashed with government policies on such issues as neutrality,
refugees, and eventually the threat of communism. These years—the
war years—made Eleanor Roosevelt the woman she became: leader,
visionary, guiding light. FDR’s death in 1945 changed her world,
but she was far from finished, returning to the spotlight as a
crucial player in the founding of the United Nations.
This is a
sympathetic but unblinking portrait of a marriage and of a woman
whose passion and commitment has inspired generations of Americans to
seek a decent future for all people. Modest and self-deprecating, a
moral force in a turbulent world, Eleanor Roosevelt was unique.