Analysis Of The Team Of Rivals By Doris Kearns Goodwin

"The Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" The Team of Rivals was written by Doris Kearns Goodwin, a renowned Pulitzer Prize winning historian and American novelist. In The Team of Rivals, Goodwin seeks to show the story surrounding Abraham Lincoln’s cabinet and his presidency. Goodwin carefully details the background of Lincoln and each member of his Cabinet by painting a picture of each man's character and personality. In The Team of Rivals, Goodwin eloquently shows the strength of Lincolns conviction as he graciously but firmly led his cabinet while still humbly considering their counsel in every matter. The Team of Rivals thoroughly and meticulously narrates one of the most tumultuous periods in American history. The cornerstone of The Team of Rivals is factual information, presented consistently throughout the book. The Team of

Her first inspiration, was that she "wanted to write a thorough book about Lincoln and his four elite cabinet members who joined together to lead the country through its greatest crisis." The second reason: "Goodwin wanted to write a book through the eyes of Lincoln himself." Kemble 2 Goodwin gathered and used legitimate sources of information to write The Team of Rivals, including an extensive amount of primary sources of information, such as autobiographies, along with the biographies of Lincoln and his cabinet members. She also used a number of secondary sources of information such as journals, documents and first hand descriptions. The information used in The Team of Rivals is coherently presented in a realistic and logical manner. It is free of gaps and not repetitive. Goodwin uses many visualizations in The Team of Rivals, while also relying on being very descriptive in order to explain the details of events very clearly and free of error. These two visualization tactics allow the reader to almost perfectly visualize the events as they played