The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism

Written by:
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Narrated by:
Edward Herrmann

Abridged Audiobook

Ratings
Book
34
Narrator
11
Release Date
November 2013
Duration
16 hours 1 minute
Summary
Winner of the 2015 Audie Award for History/Biography and Finalist for Audiobook of the Year

Pulitzer Prize–winning author and presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin’s dynamic history of Theodore Roosevelt, William H. Taft and the first decade of the Progressive era, that tumultuous time when the nation was coming unseamed and reform was in the air.

Winner of the Carnegie Medal.

Doris Kearns Goodwin’s The Bully Pulpit is a dynamic history of the first decade of the Progressive era, that tumultuous time when the nation was coming unseamed and reform was in the air.

The story is told through the intense friendship of Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft—a close relationship that strengthens both men before it ruptures in 1912, when they engage in a brutal fight for the presidential nomination that divides their wives, their children, and their closest friends, while crippling the progressive wing of the Republican Party, causing Democrat Woodrow Wilson to be elected, and changing the country’s history.

The Bully Pulpit is also the story of the muckraking press, which arouses the spirit of reform that helps Roosevelt push the government to shed its laissez-faire attitude toward robber barons, corrupt politicians, and corporate exploiters of our natural resources. The muckrakers are portrayed through the greatest group of journalists ever assembled at one magazine—Ida Tarbell, Ray Stannard Baker, Lincoln Steffens, and William Allen White—teamed under the mercurial genius of publisher S.S. McClure.

Goodwin’s narrative is founded upon a wealth of primary materials. The correspondence of more than four hundred letters between Roosevelt and Taft begins in their early thirties and ends only months before Roosevelt’s death. Edith Roosevelt and Nellie Taft kept diaries. The muckrakers wrote hundreds of letters to one another, kept journals, and wrote their memoirs. The letters of Captain Archie Butt, who served as a personal aide to both Roosevelt and Taft, provide an intimate view of both men.

The Bully Pulpit, like Goodwin’s brilliant chronicles of the Civil War and World War II, exquisitely demonstrates her distinctive ability to combine scholarly rigor with accessibility. It is a major work of history—an examination of leadership in a rare moment of activism and reform that brought the country closer to its founding ideals.
Reviews
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Anonymous

Good book but very long. Thought I would never finish it.

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Christopher Zott

Extraordinary!! The intertwined life of Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft was incredible. As always Edward Herrmann's narration was superb. Learning of the individual backgrounds of the original McClures magazine production staff was so very interesting. Doris Kearns Goodwin hit the jackpot square on with this monumental classic. I would highly recommend. I'm sure I'll read parts of it over and over.

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Dan Swain

An outstanding book. Time well-spent! I highly recommend this book.

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Ron Brindle

The story drags at times but Kearns Goodwin provides enough insight

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