First volumes of Franklin biography due in fall

J.A. Leo Lemay, H.F. duPont Winterthur Professor of English Literature

3:27 p.m., Aug. 2, 2005--The first two volumes of J. A. Leo Lemay’s The Life of Benjamin Franklin will be published by University of Pennsylvania Press in November.

LeMay, H.F. du Pont Winterthur Professor of English at UD, has spent decades researching Franklin, and the volumes are the first of a seven-volume work on the versatile founding father and his careers-scientist, inventor, journalist, politician, publisher, humorist, civic leader, printer, writer, businessman, philosopher and musician.

The first volume covers Franklin’s life up to his 1730 marriage. It explores previously unknown influences on Franklin’s philosophy and writing and attributes new writings to him.

Volume two covers the period between 1730 and Franklin’s retirement from printing in 1748. It assesses his prodigious writings and examines the illegitimate birth of his son, William Franklin.

LeMay has been called the dean of Franklin scholars, and his work is cited in best-selling books on Franklin by Walter Issacson, Gordon Wood and Edmund Morgan.

Reviewers called LeMay’s earlier work, Benjamin Franklin: Writings, the most complete one-volume collection of Franklin ever published. The William & Mary Quarterly dubbed him “the pioneering scholar of early American literature.”

Article by Kathy Canavan
Photo by Kathy F. Atkinson

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