The Death of the Multi-Volume Biography?

The Wall Street Journal has an interesting piece by Joanne Kaufman discussing the possible demise of the multi-volume biography.

I had to chuckle a bit at some of the people who were getting the multi-volume treatment, like Bing Crosby and Barbara Stanwyck. I've read two multi-volume biographies myself, Douglas Southall Freeman's George Washington: A Biography and R. E. Lee: A Biography, both of which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Multi-volume biography, or history for that matter, is probably the most difficult non-fiction format to do well. It's the rare confluence of the great writer and compelling subject that make such a work worth reading. Freeman was certainly great at it (I also own, but have not yet read, his Lee's Lieutenants, which is part biography and part military history), but I suspect that the universe of writers who can do it well is not very large.

We still have several multi-volume biographies in Canada, the latest (that I know of!) is on our first Prime Minister, Sir John A. MacDonald. A second-volume biography of D'Arcy McGee also came out recently. There are also several multi-volume works on our former PM, Pierre Trudeau.

I agree it's a challenge to make the first volume both stand-alone and compelling enough to want to read more!

The fourth installment on Lyndon Johnson, The Passage of Power by Robert A. Caro came out recently, and seems quite popular.

Caro's work on LBJ is, I believe, what sparked the piece by Kaufman. It might well be the last of its kind.

My belief is that if the major for-profit publishing houses stop supporting this type of work, it'll likely move to university publishing houses, particularly Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. It just won't be as lucrative for the authors as it might have been in the past, which in turn might cause the quality to suffer a bit since the author won't be able to devote as much time and effort to it.

The University of California Press published Volume I of the Autobiography of Mark Twain, the Complete and Authoritative edition, Volume I in 2010. Two more volumes are expected. Here's the Mark Twain page from the UC Press website:

http://www.ucpress.edu/series.php?ser=mtp

Here is the NYTimes article on Volume I as well:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/10/books/10twain.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

I think 4 is probably on target. We are all the worse for it. Yet another example where the free market has failed us. People would rather read 50 Shades of Grey.

Having read one of Branches volumes on the years surrounding Martin Luther King, Jr., I think the subject definitely required the volumes he spent years on. Truly fascinating.

Likewise, having read (many, many years ago) a book on LBJ, I think he is a worthy subject of Caro's expertise and time.

Not totally unexpected, given the cost of and challenges in publishing these days, but I will defintely miss multi-volume biographies.

6>

Oh, please.

There has always been crap published. People have always preferred crap. That's not an explanation for this phenomenon, assuming it actually exists (I'm not much for biographies, personally, so I don't know that for certain.)

An alternative hypothesis: People have been writing multi-volume biographies faster than figures significant enough to warrant them have emerged. Additionally, for all but a very few historical figures, there is not a market for more than one multi-volume biography; so it could just be that biographers are running out of people to write about at such length.

I've read the Washington and the Lee multi-volume biographies by Freeman and others as well, e.g.:

3257. Bismarck and the Development of Germany Volume I: The Period of Unification, 1815-1871, by Otto Pflanze (read 18 Oct 1999)
3258. Bismarck and the Development of Germany Volume II: The Period of Consolidation, 1871-1880, by Otto Pflanze (read 21 Oct 1999)
3259. Bismarck and the Development of Germany Volume III: The Period of Fortification, 1880-1898, by Otto Pflanze (read 22 Oct 1999)

and

1480. Jefferson the Virginian: Jefferson and His Time Volume One, by Dumas Malone (read 15 Mar 1978)
1481. Jefferson and the Rights of Man: Jefferson and His Time Volume Two, by Dumas Malone (25 Mar 1978)
1482. Jefferson and The Ordeal of Liberty: Jefferson and His Time Volume Three, by Dumas Malone (read 1 Apr 1978)
1483. Jefferson the President: First Term 1801-1804 Jefferson and His Time Volume Four, by Dumas Malone (read 8 Apr 1978)
1484. Jefferson the President: Second Term 1805-1809 Jefferson and His Time Volume Five, by Dumas Malone (read 23 Apr 1978) (Pulitzer History prize in 1975)
1674. The Sage of Monticello: Jefferson and His Time Volume Six, by Dumas Malone (read 26 Nov 1981)

and

1508. Robert Kennedy and His Times Volume I, by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (read 20 Mar 1979)
1509. Robert Kennedy and His Times Volume II, by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (read 2 Apr 1979) (National Book Award biography prize for 1979)

and

1583. Charles Evans Hughes Volume One, by Merlo J. Pusey (read 26 Aug 1980)
1585. Charles Evans Hughes Volume Two, by Merlo J. Pusey (read 7 Sep 1980) (Pulitzer Biography prize for 1952) (Bancroft Prize in 1952)

and

1575. Wilson The Road to the White House, by Arthur S. Link (read 21 Jun 1980)
1576. Wilson The New Freedom, by Arthur S. Link (read 28 Jun 1980)
1577. Wilson The Struggle for Neutrality 1914-1915, by Arthur S. Link (read 4 Jul 1980)
1578. Wilson Confusions and Crises 1915-1916, by Arthur S. Link (read 9 July 1980)
1579. Wilson Campaigns for Progressivism and Peace 1916-1917, by Arthur S. Link (read 13 July 1980)

(If Link did further volumes on Wilson I don't know what they are)

and

4041. William Jennings Bryan I. Political Evangelist 1860-1908, by Paolo E. Coletta (read 30 June 2005)
4042. William Jennings Bryan II. Progressive Politician and Moral Statesman 1909-1915, by Paolo E. Coletta (read 4 July 2005)
4043. William Jennings Bryan III. Political Puritan 1915-1925, by Paolo E. Coletta (read 8 July 2005)