by Warren C. Robinson

Why does one write a book? Each author and each book probably has its own separate answer. But, in the case of Jeb Stuart and the Confederate Defeat at Gettysburg I can honestly say I starting writing what ultimately became the book out of curiosity. I have been reading about the Civil War since I was given a book on it when I was about ten years old and the fascination has never faded. And one reason for this was that the authors and sources themselves disagreed on some important points and the innocent non-specialist was left puzzled. So, you had to become a "specialist"—that is, read everything you could find and go as far back as possible in the original source material—to decide what you thought about a given issue.

Gettysburg has always been of particular interest because I lived in Pennsylvania for many years, while I was teaching economics at Penn State, and visited the battlefield many times. JEB Stuart comes into view because my father’s family was from Virginia and JEB Stuart was his special hero.

Thus, Gettysburg and JEB Stuart came together in my reading and musing about the war and that battle in particular. I started reading the old sources again and some new ones and then, like the academic that I was (am), making notes to myself as I went along. Pretty soon I had a paper, some thirty pages long,         

Continue reading “Background on JEB Stuart and the Confederate Defeat at Gettysburg”

The Complete Letters of Henry James, 1855–1872, Vols. 1 and 2 by Henry James Edited by Pierre A. Walker and Greg W. Zacharias Introduction by Alfred Habegger“Rippling through these letters are the first imaginative stirrings of one of the greatest fiction and travel writers in the language. He was also one of the most entertaining—and prolific—correspondents. . . . James’s correspondence, its editors estimate, will run to at least 140 volumes and will include more than 10,000 letters. The most comprehensive edition before this . . . offered just 1,000 or so. The partiality of that selection is revealed by … Continue reading More Praise for The Complete Letters of Henry James

Who was the most beautiful man in the world?  Who gave him this title?  Last year, we published Janis Londraville and Richard Londraville’s The Most Beautiful Man in the World: Paul Swan, from Wilde to Warhol.   The Library Journal remarked that "Janis and Richard Londraville present Swan’s full story, carefully tracing his professional accomplishments and contributions and sensitively revealing his complex family life, personal eccentricities, and bisexual lifestyle within the context of his time, place, and culture." Would you like to see Paul Swan?  You can view a short movie, a feature created by the Lincoln Journal Star.  Continue reading How does the most beautiful man look?

The Niobrara: A River Running through Time by Paul A. Johnsgard “Paul Johnsgard’s The Niobrara is one of the very best books—if not the very best—he has written. . . . [It] displays the variety of Johnsgard’s talents. It combines graceful readability with his own sketches in a book overflowing with the evolutionary history of the remarkable Niobrara Valley.”—Harold Andersen, Omaha World-Herald Read earlier praise for The Niobrara Continue reading More Praise for The Niobrara

Songs from the Black Chair: A Memoir of Mental Interiors by Charles Barber (Bison Edition) “[A] beautifully rendered look at other people’s, and the author’s, struggles with mental illness.”—Bloomsbury Review Continue reading Praise for Songs from the Black Chair