The Gettysburg Address: A Graphic Adaptation by Jonathan Hennessey

The Gettysburg Address: A Graphic Adaptation Reviews

• 
  Ken

  I found this book revelational. Broken down into chapters named after passages of the Gettysburg Address, the book covers much more than the titular speech, from the founding of our country to the motivations and consequences of the Civil War. My education in American history is sorely lacking, and The Gettysburg Address taught me many things that I'd never spent much time thinking about: the discrepancies between the Declaration and the Constitution; why slavery abounded in the South but not the North; how the Battle of Gettysburg was won; how Lincoln's assassination negatively affected the post-war reconciliation between the states. I lack the knowledge to be a critical reader of history and so cannot confidently identify where this book falls short. But I do recommend this graphic novel as an easy and enjoyable way to learn more than what an elementary education taught us.
• 
  Mike

  An incredibly informative, nuanced, and comprehensive take on slavery, Lincoln, and the Civil War. I went into this book prepared to vet it as a potential middle school teaching volume, and put it down having been illuminated and engaged by the facts presented within. Hennessey's book on the Gettysburg Address represents a terrific potential for the graphic novel form to engage and teach readers. Highly recommended!
• 
  L. McCoy

  (Sigh) I’m interested in history and I like comics. I should like this book... but holy shit, it has problems.
  
  What’s it about?
  This is a comic that is meant to teach readers about the American Civil War and The Gettysburg Address.
  
  Pros:
  The book’s subject matter is interesting.
  The art is fantastic. It’s all well drawn and uses a wide variety of art styles so yeah, I would say that the art is without a doubt the thing that this book has going for it.
  
  Cons:
  The storytelling style kind of... okay, I’ll be blunt, it’s awful. This is one of those comics that feels the need to explain every fucking thing which kind of ruins the point of the comic book medium in some ways. I know plenty of other comics do this, even a few good ones, but part of the point of comics is to let both the writing AND art tell the story, this is basically a normal history book with illustrations filling the page.
  There’s some historical inaccuracy in this book. Admittedly I’m a bit of a nerd when it comes to... well a lot of things, one of those things being history and some of the inaccuracies are pretty common but still... it only becomes a big problem when it gets to my next problem.
  This book has an extreme political bias. It twists the events of the American Civil War and tries to say that the republicans and conservatives were the problem. Yeah, anyone who knows the real history knows that’s bullshit, it was mostly democrats pushing racism (not saying that all democrats are bad, I know plenty of great people who are democrats, just misled and probably don’t fully know what their party truly supports). It even tries to claim that Abraham Lincoln, the man who fought for black rights and freed the slaves despite the shit-ton of backlash, was racist. I’m not a hardcore republican or anything but this is just sad and pathetic. This book is a great example of why the left is a fuckin’ joke nowadays.
  
  Overall:
  This should have been really good and it is certainly not one of the worst comics I’ve read by any means but is still pretty bad. Yeah, the subject is interesting and I love the artwork but that can’t save this book from the historical inaccuracies, the terrible storytelling and the absurd political bias.
  I have another book by this author on my bookshelf and I do still plan on reading it at some point but I REALLY hope that it’s better than this.
  
  2/5
• 
  Spectre

  My first experience with a graphic book and most likely my last. The authors lectured me throughout the book cramming US history from prehistoric times to the present with a "bullet point" approach attempting to take a neutral "academic" position. Their use of Lincoln's speech was the highlight of the book but there are too many great books on the Civil War to waste time with this graphic presentation. (Note the map of Alabama on p. 125).
• 
  Patrick Sherriff

  An engrossing, surprisingly intelligent analysis of the US Civil War, its causes and continuing impact on modern American life, and all through the prism of the 272 words that Lincoln spoke at the site of the battle that decided the outcome of the war. A few key points that I came away with from the text: philosophically there is a contradiction between the Declaration of Independence's stress on equality "All men are created equal" and the Constitution's rules for limited government; that is, you can't have it both ways: either there is an overriding imperative for equality, guaranteed by big government, or there is enforced inequality, ensured by limited, differing local governments. But for all the claims on political morality, the Civil War was at root fought over slavery. The South wanted the right to carry the institution into the west and the North didn't, not so much out of love for racial equality (few white folks went that far in the 1860s) but because slavers were undercutting free labour's wages in the burgeoning western frontier. Lots of lessons for the student of history, race and anyone trying to fathom Trump's appeal.
  
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• 
  Adam Shields

  Short Review: The Gettysburg Address: A Graphic Adaptation - great art, sophisticated history and political science, clear direction. A great example of non-fiction graphic novel that is appropriate both for high school students and adults.
  
  My full review is on my blog at
  http://bookwi.se/the-gettysburg-address/
• 
  Matt

  Read this, read this, read this.
• 
  Matt Kelland

  Superb. Like their adaptation of the US Constitution, it explains the issues well, sets them in their historical context, shows the effects today, and does it all in a way that's accessible, entertaining, and memorable. A remarkable achievement.
• 
  Dani

  Too often, the Civil War is both viewed (and taught) and as a very clear-cut, simple matter of the "good-guy northerners" fighting the "evil and rebellious southerners" over slavery. This book does a wonderful job of going far beyond that shallow dichotomy and instead looks at the many issues and influential events which culminated in the Civil War. This book is not an analysis of the Gettysburg Address, though some analysis is included. Instead, it systematically goes through the famous Address, using a phrase or a few sentences as the beginning of a "chapter" or section and elaborating from there (there are no formal or numbered chapters per se, but there are definitive sections, split by sections of the Address).
  
  The beginning "four score and seven years ago" serves as the opening to the first "chapter" and looks at the founding of the United States. The reader is shown how in some ways, the seeds of unrest that led to the Civil War began at the founding of the country. The book addresses the political, social, philosophical, economical, and constitutional issues that influenced the many events resulting in the Civil War. While this book packs in a lot of information, it does so while maintaining a flowing narrative through its ongoing look at the Gettysburg Address. After setting the stage and clarifying the history, the book explains the Battle of Gettysburg itself. The book does not end with the death of Lincoln, but with the Civil Rights movements years later and stretching into today.
  
  All in all, this was a very well-written book. It was well-researched and well-organized. It was nuanced without being too dense. It read more like a narrative and less like a textbook, but I feel like I learned more than I did with any textbook I read in school! I highly recommend this book.
• 
  CJ Jones

  As a history major, I loved this book. I'm fairly certain this would be a satisfying read if you weren't a history major, though. The graphic presentation helps to break things down into digestible paragraphs rather than imposing blocks of text, and if you have a more visual learning style and found history boring and impenetrable, there's that too. The art is pretty good, the pages have a nice weight to them that says 'this is kind of important'. The book covers the American Revolution through LBJ, so the whole story can be told. That's one of the most important things in history--relating the stories. That's why most kids find history dull, is what I think. The chapters are begun with full page panels that, one by one, put forth the text of the speech; words engraved in stone suggest the carving of the speech at the Lincoln Memorial. The arguments are pleasantly comprehensive, and paint neither side as 'the bad guy'. There's supporting text from first-hand sources. Best of all, I have a richer and better understanding of the subject. I am tremendously satisfied and will probably get their US Constitution book next.
• 
  Lana

  This is quite an amazing work. I picked it up thinking I would find an accessible history of the Gettysburg Address, or at most, the Civil War. Instead it's a sophisticated argument about politics in the early days of American history. It's excellent and invigorating to read. It's amazing in its brevity of words and appropriateness of the graphic novel form.
  
  If I was teaching an early American history class, I would assign this right alongside the more "traditional" history texts. While many of Hennessey's points are stated as fact without the benefit of their well known counter-arguments, it's still both persuasive and instructive, as well as downright enjoyable. I could easily see a school assignment, from any level of school, being to unpack the arguments found in a single frame or page.
  
  The only negative I can really find with the form and function of the graphic novel was the necessary dissolution of footnotes, works cited, or any indication of the theoretical influences of Hennessey's argument.
• 
  Chalida

  I learned so much from this book. It is much more than the speech, but how the origins of Lincoln's GA came about. The beginnings of slavery, why it flourished in the South, Lincoln's beliefs in the union as accordance the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, strong positions of big vs small government, union vs. state's rights, are we whole or are we separate? Arguments going on in the political landscape of today. I've never been more appreciating of Lincoln's thoughtful wondering. Someone said today his "soft power"-- a power and useful teaching tool. One for young people and adults alike!
• 
  Joe

  A fantastic book that traces the Civil War from the founding of the country to today. You know how people say that history repeats itself? After reading this book, I see how many of the political battles we see today have already happened, often multiple times. I came in thinking I knew a decent about the Civil War, and I left realizing that I knew next to nothing. Highly recommended to everyone.
• 
  Malcolm

  For an introduction to the Civil War, I think this book is excellent. This should not be the end point of learning about it, but maybe for a reluctant reader who just wants to build a little background knowledge I could not think of a better way to start.
  
  One of the things that I really liked about it, was how it did not shy away from introducing some of the more complex issues.
• 
  Vincent Migliore

  The Gettysburg Address: A Graphic Adaptation is an amazing book about the civil war which clearly had a lot of research and commitment put into it. The art is phenomenal and it is very educating that should be taught in both high school and middle school due to the information being easy to digest, but very thorough. This is a good quick read and if you get the chance should definitely read it.
• 
  Matthew

  This would be a superb work to use for a review of all of US History for an advanced placement student getting ready for the examination.
• 
  CaroKilia

  A very compelling and clear explanation of the politics of the time. The organisation of the "chapters" around the words of the Gettysburg Address is a brilliant idea.
• 
  Dakota Morgan

  Perhaps the best of Hennessey's graphic adaptations of the literature you studied in high school Civics class. Here, Hennessey dissects the lines of the Gettysburg Address, using each as a jumping-off point for a quick lesson about American history. From pre-Revolutionary War times to now, it's amazing to see how potent the Gettysburg Address was and still is in how it touched on what it means to be American. I definitely learned more about our country's founding, the Civil War, and the Reconstruction period than I ever did from other, more comprehensive materials. Highly recommended for anyone interested in a nuanced, revelatory dissection of American history.
• 
  Faris Kaasim

  For anyone interested in American history this graphic novel is a brilliant account of the country’s foundation, the schisms that led to the civil war and events thereafter. The book reveals this history through first person accounts, including soldiers, politicians and slaves.
  
  Using each phrase and sentence from the Gettysburg address, the book illustrates discrepancies between the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence; why slavery took root in the South but not the North; the beginning of the Civil War and its end; the Battle of Gettysburg; Lincoln's evolution while in power and the effects of his assassination. A treat for all history lovers.
• 
  Edy Gies

  This was one of the best American history books I've ever read. It explained the divide between the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and why the divide is so divisive. We are still fighting about the differences over 150 years after the Civil War was concluded. I did find it very wordy and deep so my son who is 15 did not find it as helpful as I did. If you are interested in American History I would highly recommend this book.
• 
  Shane Gower

  The scholarship here is well supported and this graphic depiction flows well along with different parts of the Gettysburg Address to tell the larger story of the history of the United States through Reconstruction. This book frames well the notion of the Civil War as a “new birth of freedom”, and the importance of the speech in this context. It’s well written but also written and depicted in a way that would be engaging for students and adults alike.
• 
  Mike Higgins

  An absolute treasure of a book. It takes the Gettysburg Address, line by line, and ties it to the Nation’s past, present, and future in a succinct and well-reasoned way. On top of that, the artwork is top-notch, and really advances the general themes and arguments of the book in a stellar way. Highly, highly recommended.
• 
  Sean McGrath

  Utterly brilliant, nuanced, honest, and factual portrayal of American history through the lens of the Gettysburg Address. Perhaps too high of a reading level for most middle schoolers - initially why I started reading it - but a worthwhile and fascinating read for adults (and high schoolers if you’re into that sorta thing).
• 
  Dave Mevis

  Brilliant. I learned a lot! Wish they would have pushed a little further into what life was like for African Americans post emancipation and how the federal government helped whites with land grants and grant colleges, that were not available to blacks, essentially making a case for reparations. Nonetheless, an important, approachable work.
• 
  Holly

  This book was great and really informative. I was able to visit the Gettysburg battlefield on my way home to Chicago from Philadelphia while reading it, which was awesome. I would recommend the book, but also visiting the battlefield!
• 
  Emily

  This book was an excellent way to review American history and contemplate the ways the Civil War has and still does impact our country. I definitely recommend reading history in graphic novel form.
• 
  Eric Basford

  Bravo on this effort. They use the graphic medium effectively to summarize huge swaths of American history. While there is surely oversimplification in this book, I definitely gained new context for the Civil War. The phrase-by-phrase breakdown was super helpful.