Listen free for 30 days

  • The Last American Aristocrat

  • The Brilliant Life and Improbable Education of Henry Adams
  • Written by: David S. Brown
  • Narrated by: Jacques Roy
  • Length: 14 hrs

Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo + applicable taxes after 30 days. Cancel anytime.
The Last American Aristocrat cover art

The Last American Aristocrat

Written by: David S. Brown
Narrated by: Jacques Roy
Try for $0.00

$14.95 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $28.41

Buy Now for $28.41

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Tax where applicable.

Publisher's Summary

A “marvelous … compelling” (The New York Times Book Review) biography of literary icon Henry Adams - one of America’s most prominent writers and intellectuals, who witnessed and contributed to the United States’ dramatic transition from a colonial society to a modern nation.

Henry Adams is perhaps the most eclectic, accomplished, and important American writer of his time. His autobiography and modern classic The Education of Henry Adams was widely considered one of the best English-language nonfiction books of the 20th century. The last member of his distinguished family - after great-grandfather John Adams and grandfather John Quincy Adams - to gain national attention, he is remembered today as a historian, a political commentator, and a memoirist. 

Now, historian David Brown sheds light on the brilliant yet under-celebrated life of this major American intellectual. Adams not only lived through the Civil War and the Industrial Revolution, but he also met Abraham Lincoln, bowed before Queen Victoria, and counted Secretary of State John Hay, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, and President Theodore Roosevelt as friends and neighbors. His observations of these powerful men and their policies in his private letters provide a penetrating assessment of Gilded Age America on the cusp of the modern era. 

“Thoroughly researched and gracefully written” (The Wall Street Journal), The Last American Aristocrat details Adams’ relationships with his wife (Marian “Clover” Hooper) and, following her suicide, Elizabeth Cameron, the young wife of a senator and part of the famous Sherman clan from Ohio. Henry Adams’ letters - thousands of them - demonstrate his struggles with depression, familial expectations, and reconciling with his unwanted widower’s existence.

Offering a fresh window on 19th-century US history, as well as a more “modern” and “human” Henry Adams than ever before, The Last American Aristocrat is a “standout portrait of the man and his era” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

©2020 David S. Brown. All rights reserved. (P)2020 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

What the critics say

"Jacques Roy’s narration is beautifully paced, unhurried and deftly altered to distinguish narrative from quotation." (The Star Tribune)

"Jacques Roy's fine narration of Brown's excellent biography of historian Henry Adams is commendable on every scale, a model of pacing, expression, and tone." (AudioFile)

What listeners say about The Last American Aristocrat

Average Customer Ratings

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.