Colonel Roosevelt

This is the final volume in Morris's biographical trilogy on Theodore Roosevelt (TR), after The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt and Theodore Rex. Though he breaks no new ground, he covers the major aspects of TR's postpresidential life, including an African safari, his ill-fated third-party presidential bid, and a near-fatal Amazon expedition. Out of power, TR half understood that his fate was sealed by previous political missteps and his own mortality, as well as by his ideology. A Social Darwinist, he was driven to prove that natural selection was on his side, although this was tempered by the noblesse oblige instilled in him by his father. At his peak TR was the right man for the time, guiding an isolationist adolescent nation to world power just as he had transformed himself. Yet this final volume captures the sadness that inevitably caught up with him. Morris clearly identifies with his hero while at the same time pointing out TR's flaws as well as the limitations of those who opposed him, especially Woodrow Wilson.