Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Retelling of an Old Story
Review: To be blunt, there's not much new to say about the relationship between Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt. These two men have to be, along with John F. Kennedy and possibly Adolf Hitler, the most written-about men of the 20th Century. Certainly I've read Roy Jenkins, William Manchester, Martin Gilbert and many others on Churchill, and Kenneth Davis, Joseph Lash and several others on Roosevelt. So what is left for Jon Meacham to do? What he can do is tell an old story in a new way, and find various tid-bits of information that might not have been available to previous biographers. They don't amount to much, and there are few dazzling revelations here, but it's nice to get the occasional new nugget of fact in the midst of a lot of material you know practically by heart. I don't mean to knock this book, however: it's quite good. Meacham writes a solid, workmanlike prose, and tells the story well. If you're not a Churchill or Roosevelt buff, this is a good place to start learning about the relationship that saved Western Civilization in what might well have been its darkest hour. And if you are familiar with the story, it's a good retelling of it that makes you want to hear it all over again. Meacham is a little too hard on Roosevelt (whose deceit and duplicity tends to make him wax a wee bit judgmental), and a bit sentimental when it comes to Churchill (who could endlessly bloviate at the drop of a hat), but otherwise I give this book high marks, and recommend it to those who would like to know more about these two enigmatic and endlessly interesting men.
Rating:
Summary: A Cohesive and Compelling Narrative
Review: True friendship is never serene.
-- Marquise de Sevigne "Like most friends," Jon Meacham writes well into FRANKLIN AND WINSTON, "[they] were sometimes affectionate, sometimes cross, alternately ready to die for or murder the other. But each helped make what the other did possible." Yet for Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, it was hardly love at first sight. While Churchill later claimed not to remember their first encounter, Roosevelt stated, "I always disliked him since the time I went to England in 1917 or 1918 . . . At the dinner [for an American mission during World War I] . . . he acted like a stinker." But in the throes of the Second World War, with Great Britain facing its darkest hours, Franklin and Churchill were reacquainted and grew to become the most heralded of comrades. What constitutes friendship? Millions of words have been devoted to the subject. Emerson said, "The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, nor the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when he discovers that someone else believes in him and is willing to trust him with his friendship." An anonymous wordsmith decided, "A simple friend thinks the friendship over when you have an argument. A real friend knows that it's not a friendship until after you've had a fight." If such a relationship is so challenging between "regular people," how much more complex must it be between leaders such as Roosevelt and Churchill? The waters of friendship do not run smoothly in the best of times, let alone under the stress of global warfare. Meacham depicts Franklin and Winston at times like a pair of adolescent sweethearts, with Churchill fretting over whether the President liked him well enough. "What does he think of me?" he constantly mooned. Throw Joseph Stalin into the mix and you have an even more awkward situation. At times Roosevelt kept Churchill out of the loop, holding separate meetings with the Russian leader, not wanting "to be pinned down and acquiesce to Winston's desires." Churchill felt betrayed, as the U.S. and Russia --- not England --- were to become the new superpowers. Through it all, however, the ties that bound FRANKLIN AND WINSTON remained strong. Meacham, the managing editor for Newsweek, has culled massive amounts of correspondences and other resources to weave this cohesive and compelling narrative as he exhibits the "human dimension of Roosevelt's and Churchill's wartime lives." Both had troubled private lives, including problems with their children. Roosevelt, of course, suffered the debilitations of polio while his counterpart had something of a drinking problem. Churchill was devoted to his wife, Clementine; Roosevelt, on the other hand, had a more complex marriage to Eleanor and spent a goodly amount of time with several female relatives and friends, although the author is quick to point out that these relationships were more spiritual in nature. Many people confuse familiarity with friendship. Children will introduce their acquaintance of five minutes as "my best friend." As people grow older and become veterans of hundreds of indignations and slights --- real and imagined --- it is easy to lose that ability to form relationships. So much more complicated, it must be, when in a position of great importance and responsibility. At the conclusion of their meeting in Casablanca in 1943, Churchill called Roosevelt "the truest friend; he has the farthest vision; he is the greatest man I've ever known." Ultimately, Roosevelt and Churchill enjoyed their "cycle of friendship" as a "ritual ... reassuring in its familiarity." When FDR died in the spring of 1945, even as he was making plans to travel to England, Churchill was crushed; he could not bring himself to come to the funeral to say goodbye. In FRANKLIN AND WINSTON, Meacham has demonstrated that leaders are not made of stone. Despite their positions of power, they are still people and in need of the human connection. --- Reviewed by Ron Kaplan
Rating: 
Summary: Clever Examination of THE Friendship of the 20th Century
Review: Yes, Meacham is writing about two of the most written-about (justifiably so) figures of the past century; but this is fresh and original writing. Instead of repeating the facts and dates of so many biographies of these two great men, the author examines their friendship, the psychology of that friendship, and how their relationship shaped world history. Meacham clearly did exhaustive research for this book; the result is a work that is sure to be the definitive volume on this very interesting and significant relationship. I cannot recommend this wonderful volume highly enough to any and all interested readers.
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