GEORGE WASHINGTON

The Father of our Country is portrayed as a man obsessed with his own public image of virtue and selflessness. His efforts to shape himself, the book contends, were important because they also shaped our nation's actions and the role of the U.S. President. The biographers don't paint the first president as perfect, criticizing his failure to end slavery and noting that as a burgess in Virginia, Washington was concerned mainly with local issues and was slow to see the threat in British acts such as the Stamp Act. Richard Rohan takes on the mostly dispassionate tone of a lecturer. The biography works well as a general introduction to Washington's life. J.A.S. (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine [Published: OCT/ NOV 04]