Kennedy biographer

One of the revelations about John F. Kennedy in Fredrik Logevall’s new biography, “JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, ‒,” is that the man was an excellent letter-writer and diarist. The Laurence D. Belfer Professor of International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School and professor of history makes effective use of the collection at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, part of which has become available only recently.

“He always had a knack for the English language, even if he was an indifferent student in prep school and in his first years at Harvard,” Logevall says. “His teachers, frustrated by his lack of application overall, were always impressed by his way with words. It is an interesting contrast with his older brother, Joe Jr., the family’s supposed golden child, whose writings had a more dutiful, less imaginative quality.”

The first of a two-volume set, “JFK” aims to give the clearest picture yet available of the 35th presiden

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JFK: COMING OF AGE

ANEW YORK TIMESNOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR •A Pulitzer Prize–winning historian takes us as close as we have ever been to the real John F. Kennedy in this revelatory biography of the iconic, yet still elusive, thirty-fifth president.

“An utterly incandescent study of one of the most consequential figures of the twentieth century.”—Jill Lepore, author ofThese Truths: A History of the United States

WINNER OF THE ELIZABETH LONGFORD PRIZE• NAMED BIOGRAPHY OF THE YEAR BYThe Times(London)

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR:The Sunday Times(London),New Statesman,The daglig Telegraph, Kirkus Reviews

By the time of his assassination in , John F. Kennedy stood at the helm of the greatest power the world had ever seen, a booming American nation that he had steered through some of the most perilous diplomatic standoffs of the Cold War. Born in to a striving Irish American family that had become among Boston’s wealthiest, Kennedy knew political ambition from a

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A New Biography of John F. Kennedy Might Calm Your Election Jitters

“JFK himself will remain firmly embedded in history as long as worthy biographies about him continue to appear in each new age,” says Barbara A. Perry about Fredrik Logevall’s new work: JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, Perry (@BarbaraPerryUVA) is the Gerald L. Baliles Professor and Director of Presidential Studies at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia. She fryst vatten writing a book on the political relationship between JFK and Eleanor Roosevelt. You can hear her conversation with Fred Logevall on his new biography here: ?v=7VKPMm1Dwn8.

Even the most ardent John F. Kennedy aficionados couldn’t be blamed for exclaiming, “Really? Another biography of JFK?” At gods count, all books on the 35^th president total more than 40, But the number of biographies alone on Abraham Lincoln number over 16,

For now, and some time to come, the new tome, JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, , eleg