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Reader's Digest Great Biographies: Christopher Columbus, Mariner; Marie Antoinette; The Head and Heart of Thomas Jefferson; The Life of Charlotte Bronte
Reader's Digest Great Biographies Christopher Columbus Mariner Marie Antoinette The Head and Heart of Thomas Jefferson The Life of Charlotte Bronte Author:Samuel Eliot Morison, Stefan Zweig, John Dos Passos, Elizabeth Gaskell Christopher Columbus, Mariner by Samuel Eliot Morison — Threatened by mutiny after almost two months at sea, lost in a vast ocean with only hearsay to guide him, Columbus at last made an island landfall. Seeking a new route to the riches of the East, he had stumbled upon a whole new world. To recreate these events, naval historian Moriso... more »n followed Columbus's route across the Atlantic in a small sailing vessel. His masterly research, coupled with a lucid prose, won him a Pulitzer Prize for biography.
Marie Antoinette by Stefan Zweig (translated from the German by Eden and Cedar Paul)
Married at fifteen to the heir to the French throne, Marie Antoinette was marked for a destiny as spectacular as it was cruel. Beautiful and spirited, reckless and extravagant, the wife of Louis XVI did whatever pleased her while the streets of Paris boiled with revolution. Yet this girl who began life as the pampered daughter of an Austrian emperor found at the end the spirit to mount the guillotine with the silent courage of a true queen.
The Head and Heart of Thomas Jefferson by John Dos Passos
A distinguished American writer movingly describes the first fifty years in the life of that versatile and dedicated champion of the common man, Thomas Jefferson.
The Life of Charlotte Bronte by Elizabeth Gaskell
The wild Yorkshire moors were the backdrop for a strange and poignant drama played out by the Bronte sisters of Haworth. Each was gifted -- and each died young. But two won lasting fame for the novels they wrote -- Emily for Wuthering Heights and Charlotte for Jane Eyre. Elizabeth Gaskell, a talented novelist in her own right, knew Charlotte and the family well. After Charlotte's death, she conceived this hauntingly lovely portrait of her friend, which has become a classic of its kind.« less