Four Parallel Lives of Eight Notable Individuals

By Stephan Politzer

The parallel lives of Edward I and Andrew Jackson, William Wallace and Osceola, Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln and Alexander II of Russia are inaugural essays in what will be a series of essays paralleling the lives of significant people. The major inspiration for this project is Plutarch’s Lives, also known as Parallel Lives, written in Greek around 100 C.E. Its surviving text consists of twenty-three paired Greek and Roman biographies, plus four unpaired lives. Mestrius Plutarchus (45-125 C.E.), Priest of the Delphic Oracle, wrote his Lives of famous Greeks and Romans initially for an educated lay audience, an elite in his time. His short biographies represent both popular history and moral instruction. Plutarch’s style is consistent throughout: Short histories of two famous personages (generally a Greek and a Roman) and then their lives compared. The comparison is in essence a moral lesson. Plutarch was interested in how the characters of great men (not women) influenced their actions and played on the destinies of civilizations. Our intent is similar to Plutarch’s (our future parallel lives will include women) but our approach is considerably different. Since, unlike in Plutarch’s time, capsule biographies are readily available in any number of easily obtained publications and on the Internet, we eschew them and launch directly into parallel comparisons of our subjects’ lives. We share with Plutarch the desire to write for an educated lay audience but for one that is far more expansive than it was in Plutarch’s time. To this end, we have attempted to keep our writing style conversational and to use only those references that can be found readily in public libraries, bookstores and on the Internet. We have not and will not delve into special collections and other closed or reserved sources. The bulk of our sources have come from the Internet. Anyone can check our sources either at their local public library or on the Internet, papyrus of the twenty-first century. In this regard, we must make a small comment on notation. Since Wikipedia is commonly known to be online, we will not cite it as so when referencing it in the four essays.

Like Plutarch, we are not strictly writing either history or biography. We are writing “moral lessons” in the broadest sense of the expression. Our lessons more than Plutarch’s are open-ended.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stephan Politzer
• Release date: Jun 20, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458089908

Book preview

Four Parallel Lives of Eight Notable Individuals

Edward I of England and Andrew Jackson

William Braveheart Wallace and Osceola, Seminole War Leader

Theodore Roosevelt and John Fitzgerald Kennedy

Abraham Lincoln and Tsar Alexander II

By Stephan F. Politzer and Alex Shishin

Published by Smashwords

Copyright 2011 Stephan F. Politzer and Alex Shishin

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Table of Contents

Introduction: Notes on Methodology and Intent

Edward I of England and Andrew Jackson: The Accidental Democrats?

William Braveheart Wallace and Osceola: Legends and Legacies

Theodore Roosevelt and John Fitzgerald Kennedy: Illness, Athleticism, Nationalism

Abraham Lincoln and Tsar Alexander II: Two Great Emancipators

Introduction: Notes on Methodology and Intent

The parallel lives of Edward I and Andrew Jackson, William Wallace and Osceola, Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln and Alexander II of Russia are inaugural essays in what will be a series of essays paralleling the lives of significant people. The major inspiration for this project is Plutarch’s Lives, also known as Parallel Lives, written in Greek around 100 C.E. Its surviving text consists of twenty-three paired Greek and Roman biographies, plus four unpaired lives. Mestrius Plutarchus (45-125 C.E.), Priest of the Delphic Oracle, wrote his Lives of famous Greeks and Romans initially for an educated lay audience, an elite in his time. His short biographies represent both popular history and moral instruction. Plutarch’s style is consistent throughout: Short histories of two famous personages (generally a Greek and a Roman) and then their lives compared. The comparison is in essence a moral lesson. Plutarch was interested in how the characters of great men (not women) influenced their actions and played on the destinies of civilizations. Our intent is similar to Plutarch’s (our future parallel lives will include women) but our approach is considerably different. Since, unlike in Plutarch’s time, capsule biographies are readily available in any number of easily obtained publications and on the Internet, we eschew them and launch directly into parallel comparisons of our subjects’ lives. We share with Plutarch the desire to write for an educated lay audience but for one that is far more expansive than it was in his time. To this end, we have attempted to keep our writing style conversational and to use only those references that can be found readily in public libraries, bookstores and on the Internet. We have not and will not delve into special collections and other closed or reserved sources. The bulk of our sources have come from the Internet. Anyone can check our sources either at their local public library or on the Internet. In this regard, we must make a small comment on notation. Since Wikipedia is commonly known to be online, we will not cite it as so when referencing it in the four essays.

Like Plutarch, we are not strictly writing either history or biography. We are writing moral lessons in the broadest sense of the expression. Our lessons more than Plutarch’s are open-ended.

Sources

McCutchen, Wilmot. Plutarch Ploutaros (circa 45 - 125 A.D.): Priest of the Delphic Oracle: February 12, 2000.

19 June 2005

http://www.eclassics.com/plutarch.htm

Plutarch. Lives (The Project Gutenberg E-text of Plutarch’s Lives, by A.H. Clough. Also known as Parallel Lives, written in Greek -100 A.D. Includes 50 biographies, 23 Greek, 23 Roman, 2 others.): 1996.

19 June 2005

http://digital.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=674

Note on the Texts

The four parallel lives were originally published in somewhat different form as follows:

Alex Shishin and Stephan F. Politzer, Parallel Lives: Edward I and Andrew Jackson, The JAIAS Journal, Tokyo: The Japan Association of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, Vol. 6, June 2005, 1-11.

Alexander Shishin and Stephan F. Politzer, Parallel Lives: William ‘Braveheart’ Wallace and Osceloa, War Chief of the Seminoles, Tabard, Kobe; The English Literature Association of Kobe Women’s University, No.21, March 2006, 3-26.

Alexander Shishin and Stephan F. Politzer, Parallel Lives: Theodore Roosevelt and John Fitzgerald Kennedy--Illness, Athleticism and Nationalism, Tabard, Kobe; The English Literature Association of Kobe Women’s University, No.21, March 2007.

Alexander Shishin and Stephan F. Politzer, Two Great Emancipators: Abraham Lincoln and Alexander II, Tsar of Russia, Tabard, Kobe; The English Literature Association of Kobe Women’s University, No.22, March 2008.

Edward I of England and Andrew Jackson: The Accidental Democrats?

Overture

Edward I of England (1239-1307) and Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) influenced the trend towards democracy and constitutional government, either inadvertently or deliberately. At the same time, both, in varying degrees, put deliberate limitations on the democratic impetus, especially in the area of inclusiveness, which limited progress toward that end. As a result, the memory of each of these statesmen is both revered among certain people and reviled among others.

Edward and Jackson began life with only one common inherited characteristic: Each was destined to become physically tall. Edward was nicknamed Longshanks due to both his great height and stature and Jackson stood well over six feet as a grown man. Otherwise no two future statesmen could have been as different from one another as they were at birth. Edward was destined to inherit office and power from his father, King Henry III, and would rule from 1272 until his death. Jackson was a poor orphan by age fourteen who worked his way up in the world through military service and law before entering politics. By the time he became the seventh U.S. President (1829-1837) he was a rich slave owner and, therefore, a gentleman.

Both men were born into tumultuous times. Edward inherited a kingdom weakened by his father’s misrule that had culminated into civil war. Jackson came of age during the American Revolution. Edward’s entire life was defined by warfare, most of it of his own making. Jackson too was at war throughout his life. He fought the British as a boy in the American Revolution and as a commanding officer in the War of 1812; as president he fought Native Americans. He also fought duels of honor that nearly cost him his life and left a bullet permanently lodged near his heart.

Both Edward I and Andrew Jackson were defined by their times more than by the peculiarities in their personalities. Yet their peculiarities--both were possessed of passionate, often violent temperaments--helped put their individual stamps on history.

Edward, nurtured to inherit the office of King, was an able and shrewd administrator. Had he been too much his father’s son, it is likely that his many wars, which threatened disaster, would have adversely altered English history. Andrew Jackson’s temper was above all else fired by an ambition nurtured in the soil of poverty. His duels of honor were as much compelled by the hurt that comes of poverty and the desire for gentleman status as they were by the particular insults to him. This colored his presidential style. Hall Morris, on-line, quotes James Parton (1822-91), the father of American biography, as calling Jackson, A democratic aristocrat. An urbane savage. An atrocious saint. This was the Jackson who appealed to masses of ordinary white voting men after the revolution and rode the crest of democratic populism that would care him to the presidency.

In considering the parallel lives of the Edward I and Andrew Jackson as we unfold them below, it must always be keep in mind that they were born into unequal stations, possessed with unequal powers and contending with very different social forces. Much of Andrew Jackson’s life was indirectly influenced by Edward I’s manipulations of Parliament.

The Careers of Edward I and Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Impetus

In their youths Edward and Jackson both fought in wars and endured capture by the enemy, Edward at the hands of his enemy Simon de Montford (he later escaped) and Jackson as a boy revolutionary at the hands of the British. Edward came out of his adventures physically unscathed. Jackson did not. Jackson’s face bore the scar of a British officer’s sword that would have killed him had he not deflected it with his arm, which was cut to the bone. (Jackson had refused to polish the officer’s boots.) Jackson’s duels, as noted, left their marks.

Edward received a traditional medieval education as befitting a king-to-be: That is to say he learned both the wisdoms and prejudices of his age. Most of these he seems to have accepted uncritically. Whatever else he was, Edward was not an intellectual. Jackson’s education was basic and limited by his own choice. We are told by Spark Notes (on-line):

Jackson was extremely bright and began reading at