Historical Essays by James Ford Rhodes brings together reflections by the Pulitzer Prize–winning American historian on the writing and study of history. Rhodes, celebrated for his multivolume history of the United States, here turns to broader themes, discussing the craft of the historian, notable predecessors, and questions of method and interpretation.
The essays range over American and European subjects, touching on historiography, the use of sources, and appraisals of fellow historians such as Edward Gibbon and others. Written in a clear and cultivated style, the collection reveals Rhodes’s views on what makes history both a science and an art. For readers interested in historiography and the intellectual life of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America, the volume offers thoughtful and accessible commentary from a leading practitioner.