Personal Memoirs

One of the most unflinching studies of war in our literature.--William McFeeley. Among the autobiographies of great military figures Ulysses S. Grant''s is certainly one of the finest and it is arguably the most notable literary achievement of any American president: a lucid compelling and brutally honest chronicle of triumph and failure. From his frontier boyhood to his heroics in battle to the grinding poverty from which the Civil War ironically rescued him these memoirs are a mesmerizing deeply moving account of a brilliant man told with great courage as he reflects on the fortunes that shaped his life and his character. Written under excruciating circumstances (as Grant was dying of throat cancer) encouraged and edited from its very inception by Mark Twain it is a triumph of the art of autobiography.The books in the Modern Library War series have been chosen by series editor Caleb Carr according to the significance of their subject matter their contribution to the field of military history and their literary merit.