The Past Speaks

After his martyrdom Abraham Lincoln became a global figure. As David Lloyd George put it, Lincoln “lost his nationality in death.”

The Last Photograph of Lincoln Taken While He Was Alive

To mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of Lincoln, a conference on Lincoln’s global impact was held in Oxford. The Global Lincoln contains the best papers presented there. It is now available for pre-order on Amazon and will be published later this year.

Here is the book summary:

More than any other American historical figure, Abraham Lincoln towers over the global landscape, a leader who spoke–and continues to speak–to people around the world. The Global Lincoln tells the unknown and remarkable story of this great president’s worldwide legacy. Edited by acclaimed Lincoln biographer Richard Carwardine and Jay Sexton, this fascinating volume brings together leading historians from around the globe–including such writers as Harold Holzer, Kenneth O. Morgan, and David W. Blight–to explore the image and influence of Lincoln in places ranging from Germany to Japan, India to Ireland, Africa and Argentina to the American South. The contributors show that the heart of Lincoln’s global celebrity lies in his status as the archetypal self-made man, his record of successful leadership in wartime, his role as the “Great Emancipator,” and his resolute defense of popular government. Yet “Lincoln” has also been a malleable and protean figure, one who is forever being redefined to meet the needs of those who invoke him, from Marx and Tolstoy to soldiers fighting in the “Lincoln Brigades.”

Here is the programme of the 2009 conference, which gives a sense of the sort of papers we can expect to see in the book.