1776

Þetta er að mörgu leyti fróðleg bók þar sem McCullough byggir frásögn sína mikið á dagbókum og bréfum þátttakenda í bandaríska frelsisstríðinu. Þannig fær lesandinn góða innsýn í hugarheim og væntingar persónanna í stríðinu.
Gallinn við ritið er hins vegar sá að höfundurinn einblínir á árið sjálft en fer lítið út í aðdraganda stríðsins en bardagar höfðu blossað upp ári fyrr og áttu eftir að halda áfram eftir 1776. Hann virðist krefjast þess af lesandanum að hann sé vel upplýstur um þetta tímabil í sögu Bandaríkjanna og hann veitir öðrum þjóðum og alþjóðlegu samhengi við stríðið litla athygli. Þetta er saga fyrir Bandaríkjamenn fyrsta og fremst að því er mér fannst.
1776 er því einungis uppfyllingarrit fyrir þá sem hafa kynnt sér vel uppreisn bandaríkjamanna undan nýlenduveldi Breta. ( )

The history of an important moment in the war for independence. Highlighting George Washington and the men who made this year so important as the colonies began their battle for freedom. ( )

Well done history by the master, David McCullough. I say master because of his reputation - this is the first book of his I've read. Will read more. My only complaint was that the book covers the Revolutionary War events of late 1775 through early 1777, then ends abruptly. I know enough about the war to predict that McCullough would end on the high notes of Trenton and Camden, and that's what he did. I wish McCullough would have turned this into a history of the entire war. Then again, I just read a masterful one of those, Almost a Miracle by John Firling. This book contains much lengthier quotes from primary sources and goes into more detail about certain events than Firling's book, so it was good to have read them both essentially back to back, to feed my current fascination with the American revolution. ( )

I read David McCullough's John Adams last year and really liked it. But I must confess, I enjoyed this one more. Since 1776 focuses on one seminal year in American history, it was a shorter book. The action was so thick that it read like a novel. I had thought I was familiar with our nation's beginnings. I knew George Washington was revered as a great general, but I didn't really understand why. This book demonstrates why Washington was a great general, in spite of his flaws.

The people of America were really no more united then than they are now. What they did have was a vision of what could be, and enough of them were willing to suffer hardship and deprivation that it became reality. McCullough doesn't gloss over the uncomfortable bits. He doesn't turn the British and Hessians into monsters and he doesn't make the Americans look like noble saints. What he does do is present a balanced, researched portrait of an extraordinary time and place that changed the course of world history. And that's no small feat. ( )

As the title indicates, this thoroughly researched book by David McCullough covers the events of 1776, including the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War. McCullough goes into painstaking detail to describe the perspectives and experiences of those who participated in those events, with a particular focus on George Washington and those who served with him.

In telling those stories, McCullough does not shy away from presenting critiques or the hard parts of our history. Indeed, McCullough specifically details some of the criticisms that were levied at Washington by his peers, as well as Washington’s own self-doubts and occasional indecisiveness. Yet, in the end, McCullough concludes that Washington was a truly gifted leader and that in the American victory in the Revolutionary War—beginning with Washington’s legendary crossing of the Delaware and victory in Trenton—one can see a miracle. As McCullough puts it, it was in those victories that occurred in the bleakest of times that Washington and America found themselves.

Note: this book is written from a scholarly and historian’s perspective. It is not a typical novel with page-turning type of suspense (beyond the suspense coming from history itself). If you understand that going in, you will appreciate this book far more than if you’re reading it solely to be entertained. ( )