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''Wilson'' is a 2013 biography of the 28th President of the United States Woodrow Wilson by Pulitzer Prize-winning author A. Scott Berg. The book is a ''New York Times'' Best Seller. == Background == When asked why he spent the last thirteen years writing a biography of Wilson, Berg replied "The simple answer is that he was the architect of much of the last century and re-drew the map of the world."〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=vanityfair.com )〕 But there were personal reasons, as well. Berg was given a copy of Gene Smith’s ''“When the Cheering Stopped: The Last Years of Woodrow Wilson"'' when he was in the 11th grade〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=washingtontimes.com )〕 and his "budding obsession" has grown ever since.〔 At 15, he put a picture of Wilson on his bedroom wall,〔 a campaign poster given to him by his brother, Jeff〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=lamag.com )〕 The author had four heroes when he was in high school: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Adlai Stevenson, Woodrow Wilson, and Don Quixote.〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=paw.princeton.edu )〕 The fact that the first three went to Princeton helped induce Berg to enroll. Berg spent his college years at Princeton, the college Wilson was president of, graduating in 1971. He also taught a class in biography writing while there doing research for the book.〔 Berg began researching Wilson in 2000: "I have an image of him in my mind that is unlike any picture I have seen anywhere else, based on material at Princeton and 35 years of researching and thinking about him".〔Greenstein Altmann, Jennifer. ("Illuminating lives: Berg researches Wilson biography while teaching ‘Life Writing’" ), Princeton Weekly Bulletin, 18 February 2008. Retrieved on 23 September 2013.〕 “When most people think of Woodrow Wilson, they see a dour minister’s son who never cracked a smile, where in fact he was a man of genuine joy and great sadness. I did not write a diplomatic history or a history of foreign affairs in his life. I wanted the reader to walk through his life and see it with his eyes.”〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=publishersweekly.com )〕 "It takes a certain amount of egotism for a biographer to think he has something new to add to the record, and I believe I do."〔 Berg hesitated before writing the biography. "Yet I'd been afraid of writing about him all my life because I held him so high and he was so overwhelming a figure."〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=heraldscotland.com )〕 Berg visited many of Wilson's homes during his research, including his birthplace, his childhood homes and the Woodrow Wilson House in Washington, D.C. "Getting a sense of place is extremely important to me as a biographer. And I make a point, as I have in all of my books, to visit as many of the places in the lives of my subjects as possible."〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=blog.preservationnation.org )〕 Berg purchased a set of Arthur A. Link's 69-volume compilation of "Wilson's greatest hits" (that Link spent 40 years collecting) as part of his research. He explored other libraries, such as the Library of Congress and the Princeton Library for documents not in Link's collection. Berg was the first allowed access to the correspondence of the President's second daughter Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre,〔 found when her son died a few years ago,〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=chicagotonight.wttw.com )〕 as well as the papers of his close friend and doctor, Cary T. Grayson.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Woodrow Wilson Brought New Executive Style To The White House )〕 Berg described the Grayson discovery, found in Grayson's garage, as "trunk loads" of papers.〔 Berg found that Grayson kept "meticulous" notes, covering years of contact with Wilson, especially the last years of his presidency.〔 "You have no idea what a thrill that was, quite wonderful," he says.〔 Berg worked without researchers or secretaries for the thirteen-year research/writing process.〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=rollcall.com )〕 ''Wilson'' was always intended to be a single-volume: "There are several multi-volume (biographies ), and that's the last thing I wanted to do...I wanted to write a page-turner, and I think it is."〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wilson (book)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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