Last Lion: The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy - Couverture rigide

 
9781410415035: Last Lion: The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy

Synopsis

Draws on interviews with family members and associates to offer a portrait of the life and achievements of Ted Kennedy.

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Présentation de l'éditeur

No figure in American public life has had such great expectations thrust upon him, or has responded so poorly. But Ted Kennedy -- the youngest of the Kennedy children and the son who felt the least pressure to satisfy his father's enormous ambitions -- would go on to live a life that no one could have predicted: dismissed as a spent force in politics by the time he reached middle age, Ted became the most powerful senator of the last half century and the nation's keeper of traditional liberalism.
As Peter S. Canellos and his team of Boston Globe reporters show in this revealing and intimate biography, the gregarious and least academically successful of the Kennedy boys has witnessed greater tragedy and suffered greater pressure than any of his siblings. Late one night in the summer of 1969, he left the scene of a fatal automobile accident on Chappaquiddick Island. The death there of a young woman from his brother's campaign would haunt and ultimately doom his presidential ambitions. Political rivals turned his all-too-human failings -- drinking, philandering, and divorce -- into a condemnation of his liberal politics.
But as the presidency eluded his grasp, Kennedy was finally liberated from the expectations of others, free to become his own man. Once a symbol of youthful folly and nepotism, he transformed himself in his later years into a symbol of wisdom and perseverance. And as his health failed, he anointed the young and ambitious presidential candidate Barack Obama, whom many commentators compared to his brother Jack. The Kennedy brand of liberalism was rediscovered by a new generation of Americans.

Présentation de l'éditeur

No figure in American public life has had such great expectations thrust upon him and fallen short of them so quickly. But Ted Kennedy, the gregarious, pudgy, and least academically successful of the Kennedy boys, became the most powerful senator of the last half century and the nation’s keeper of traditional liberalism.

As Peter S. Canellos and his team of Boston Globe reporters show in this intimate biography, Ted witnessed greater tragedy and suffered greater pressure than his siblings. He inherited a generation’s dreams and ambitions, and was expected to help confront his nation’s problems and to build a fairer society. But political rivals turned his all-too-human failings into a condemnation of his liberal politics. As the presidency eluded his grasp, Kennedy was finally free to become his own man. He transformed himself into a symbol of wisdom and perseverance.

Now, in two new chapters, Last Lion reveals how Kennedy battled cancer while helping Barack Obama bring about the biggest reform of health care in the nation’s history, and how he said good-bye to his family, friends, and enemies.

Perceptive and carefully reported, drawing from candid interviews with the Kennedy family, Last Lion captures magnificently the life, historic achievements, and personal redemption of Ted Kennedy, and offers a fresh assessment of his enduring legacy.

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Autres éditions populaires du même titre

9781439138175: Last Lion: The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy

Edition présentée

ISBN 10 :  1439138176 ISBN 13 :  9781439138175
Editeur : Simon & Schuster, 2009
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