Might be a good book to read right now, as the zeitgeist of the original Gilded Age closely mirrors our own era (the new Gilded Age). Crazy politics and a contested election that nearly led to a second civil war provide the backdrop for recently returned American expat Charles Schuyler and his titled, widowed French daughter Emma's sojourn through the titular United States centennial year. Nearly destitute, they are trying to cash in on the riches to be gained from the rapid economic growth of t...

This is the book that looks at the Presidential election of 1876. In that Centennial year that gave us President Rutherford B, Hayes in the most corrupt election of many corrupt elections. That election was stolen, the votes of the people were thrown out. (Does this sound familiar?) and corrupt politicians, legislators and the current sitting President, U. S. Grant all joined together to steal the Presidency for Mr. Hayes, and brought the country close to second Civil War. Gore Vidal brings it a...

Vidal tackles the election of 1876 with the same historical fiction lens as Burr and Lincoln, only for a period in American history that deserves as much public awareness as the founding and Civil War. And, brother, is this one timely. Questionable election returns, the Democrat candidate winning the popular election, faithless electors turning the decision over to the House, who make a sweetheart deal between Republicans and Southern Democrats to let the Republican win -- sound familiar? This e...

1876: The year everybody fell asleep reading this boring book.

I was amazed and disappointed to learn from the author at the end of listening to this audible book while following along with the e-book that the main characters in this book, the journalist and his daughter, were fictional.Although the title of this book 1876 coincides with the 100th anniversary of the United States, that event is somewhat secondary to most of the story although there is a side trip to the national or world fair that celebrated the one hundredth year. The real major event is t...

Another of Gore Vidal's "Empire" series, set against the background of America's celebration of the centennial of the War of Independence.

This was my first Gore Vidal novel, and I was less than impressed. By his own estimation, Gore Vidal is the greatest American historical novelist ever, and in my experience, arrogant novelists are rarely any good. "1876" did little to change my mind about this.The tragedy of it all is that this novel could have been great. It is set in 1876, the American centennial, with all the drama of Reconstruction, the corruption of the Grant administration, the grand defeat of Custer at Little Big Horn, an...

One of Gore Vidal's weakest novels, 1876 examines America's Gilded Age with an excess of archness and a dearth of wit. An antiquated Charlie Schuyler, the narrator-hero of Burr, returns with his daughter on a tour of America during its centennial celebration, becoming disgusted and fascinated by postbellum America's inequalities and the open corruption of Ulysses Grant's Administration. Throughout, Vidal succumbs to his worst instincts as a writer: nearly two-thirds of the text consists of Schuy...

I really enjoyed this book, but I would only recommend it to people who love historical fiction and deep dives into important and overlooked periods in American history. Vidal's research and attention to detail is mind-blowing. As I read, I had my laptop open to research historical characters and events, many of which I was familiar, but the overwhelming majority I had never heard of before. In most cases, Vidal's descriptions were clearer, more thorough, and more succinct than the internet sour...

This third book in Vidal’s Narratives of Empire is a pleasant way to absorb facts about the politics and society of a defining period in American history - the presidential election of 1876.We are shown the massive changes New York underwent in the period between 1836 to 1875 from the fictional narrator’s perspective, and we learn that greedy, corrupt politicians and election stealing are not particular to our times.Perhaps it’s the narrator’s bias, but there seems to be a whiff of partisanship

Another in Vidal's absurdly entertaining series. This, unlike Burr and Lincoln, has no powerful central presence to provide an anchor, and so occasionally falls flat, but the portraits of Tilden and Grant are both excellent, if tantalizingly elliptical. As a wishy-washy liberal, I wish he had emphasized more the corruption on the Democratic side of the 1876 contest (surely one of the most sordid elections in our history), but I suppose he had his reasons.And what is his fixation on doting widowe...

I'm going through my Gore Vidal collection and am re-reading (and in some cases for the first time reading) the Narratives of Empire collection. I love 1876. Every damn page of it. This is the way America was/is not as the gullible unhistoric American public perceives it. I'm a trained historian, and GV is so correct in his portrayals of so-called icons. 1876 is not only a narrative of post-war Washington/New York high and political society, but a comedy of manners. The hand of Henry Adams isn't...

What a pity! I've just come to the end of another thoroughly enjoyable book by Gore Vidal.It is 1876, the hundredth anniversary of the founding of the USA. The widowed Charlie Schuyler returns to New York with his widowed daughter, who was born in France during the 40 years that he was living there. Charlie, the narrator of Vidal's novel Burr, wants to see how his native land has changed since he last lived there. He also hopes that Emma, his glamorous daughter, will find a new husband.1876 is w...

i like historical fiction. i also like books that take place in 19th century new york city. that being said, this book contains both those elements but just didn't do it for me. gore vidal is a phenomenal writer (as if gore f*ing vidal needs me to validate that) but here he gets too pre-occupied with NYC high society and the story goes nowhere. or maybe the NYC socialites were the whole story. either way i had a hard time finishing it. the first person memoir style was killing me by the end -- e...

Pure Vidal - historical fiction, highly readable decent writing, part of a trilogy, lots of irony, satire, a good time. Doesn't particularly hold too steady in terms of narrative, uneven at times, but lots of fun nevertheless.

I read this one immediately after reading Vidal's Burr, its predecessor, during the winter break from school of 1983/84. As usual, with Vidal, the book is well researched, its events plausible.

In this, the third of the Annals of America novels, Vidal comes to assert something he merely suggests as a possibility in the early ones: protagonist Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler is the illegitimate son of Aaron Burr. I like that detail, but I love what it does to the series as a whole. This alternative to the conventional American history really is a kind of bastard perspective.At a broad level, the series takes us back to moments of American history that we think we know and then reimagines

I read this in 2006, the year after Dubyah's second election "victory". I had no idea at the time that American elections had previous when it came to vote rigging.Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler is a recently impoverished writer returning to America after thirty years in Europe, where he witnessed the events leading up to the Paris Commune. Through his eyes Vidal paints a picture of New York society at that time, then takes us to Washington DC and its movers and shakers. Vidal brings to life both...

What can I say, that I have not already said about Gore Vidal? He is undeniably one of the great American writers of the twentieth century, along with Toni Morrison, Capote, Hemingway, Faulker, Baldwin, Fitzgerald, O'Hare, and so on. I also am confident that he would agree, but not agree totally with my assessment of the other great writers I mentioned."1876" is in a sense the third novel in the series that critics have come to name "Narratives of Empire." The first was the one on Aaron Burr and...

This witty historical novel by Gore Vidal is centered around the disputed presidential election between the Democratic candidate Tilden and the Republican candidate Hayes. The major (and fictional) characters are Charles Shermerhorn Schuyler and is daughter Emma, the widowed Princess d'Agrigente. Schuyler, the illegitimate son of Aaron Burr, has returned to the United States inlate 1875 from many decades of residence in Europe (mainly France) as a writer in hopes of recouping his wealth, lost in...