Description

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Churchill Sizes Up the Giants of His Age, Offers Wisdom for Our Own

Winston Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature on the strength of “his mastery of historical and biographical description.” Nowhere is that mastery more evident than in Great Contemporaries(1937), which features Churchill’s brief lives of those he called “Great Men of our age.” ISI Books is proud to publish a brand-new, illustrated edition of this neglected classic. Great Contemporaries profiles towering figures ranging from Franklin Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, Lawrence of Arabia, and Leon Trotsky to Charlie Chaplin, H. G. Wells, Rudyard Kipling, and George Bernard Shaw. This edition—the first in twenty years—includes five essays that have never appeared in any previous version, some thirty black-and-white photographs, and an enlightening introduction and annotations by noted Churchill scholar James W. Muller. Written in the decade before Churchill became prime minister, the essays in Great Contemporaries focus on the challenges of statecraft at a time when the democratic revolution was toppling older regimes based on tradition and aristocratic privilege. Churchill’s keen observations take on new importance in our own age of roiling political change. Ultimately, Great Contemporaries provides fascinating insight into the statesman’s perspective. Churchill’s objective is clear: he tries to learn from these giants what makes a man great. He approaches his subjects with a measuring eye, finding their limitations at least as revealing as their merits. This handsome new edition of Great Contemporaries brings back Churchill’s unmatched insights and unforgettable prose for a new generation of readers and leaders.

About the Author

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Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) served twice as prime minister of the United Kingdom, held numerous political and cabinet positions, fought in wars on four continents, and wrote more than forty books. In 1953 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. About the Editor James W. Muller, professor of political science at the University of Alaska, Anchorage, is academic chairman of the Churchill Centre, a by-fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge, and a recipient of the Farrow Award for Excellence in Churchill Studies. He is the editor of Winston Churchill’s Thoughts and Adventures, also available from ISI Books.

Praise For…

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“By far the most important, thoughtful edition of Churchill’s famous personality sketches ever published . . . The indispensable ‘desert island’ text for any marooned Churchillian.”
—Finest Hour