Abe: A Novel of the Young Lincoln

In the early 1980s, politicians got a lot of mileage out of reading--or noisily claiming to have read--Gore Vidal's biographical novel Lincoln. Now pols wanting to lay claim to the 16th president's mythical integrity have another book to add to the shelf. In Abe: A Novel of the Young Lincoln, Richard Slotkin sets out to discover the very roots of Lincoln's politics. And this American Studies professor goes for the deep roots: In the first chapter, Abe listens to his mother tell him the story of "how Moses would grow up tall, and whup the man that whupped the children, change the serpents to sticks and break the sea so the children could get over, and home to their milk and honey..." Young Abe founders when he loses his adored mother and sister to early death, and sets off on a river journey to New Orleans.

His character is formed--and his notion of America--as he travels from the North to the South. Along the way he forges an uncompromising, difficult friendship with Sephus, a slave. Slotkin handles this relationship deftly, allowing it complexity and avoiding any off-key Noble Savage notes. Here he underplays the men's first handshake, a physical acknowledgment of their uneasy equality: "Without thinking Abe put out his hand. Sephus looked at it. Then gave it a quick shake with his big dry sandy-palmed hand, turned, and went to call the men to supper." Nor does Slotkin make his hero a saint. Right afterward, "Abe was embarrassed. It was thoughtless to shake hands like that. If the others seen him, they'd give him the laugh." In the end, of course, Abe returns to the North and runs for office. In the meantime, Slotkin has given us a rough Lincoln, one who accepts and provides no easy answers. --Claire Dederer