The Greater Journey

Americans in Paris

By: David McCullough

Narrated by: Edward Herrmann

The #1 bestseller that tells the remarkable story of the generations of American artists, writers, and doctors who traveled to Paris, fell in love with the city and its people, and changed America through what they learned, told by America’s master historian, David McCullough.

Not all pioneers went west.

In The Greater Journey, David McCullough tells the enthralling, inspiring—and until now, untold—story of the adventurous American artists, writers, doctors, politicians, and others who set off for Paris in the years between 1830 and 1900, hungry to learn and to excel in their work. What they achieved would profoundly alter American history.

Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female doctor in America, was one of this intrepid band. Another was Charles Sumner, whose encounters with black students at the Sorbonne inspired him to become the most powerful voice for abolition in the US Senate. Friends James Fenimore Cooper and Samuel F. B. Morse worked unrelentingly every day in Paris, Morse not only painting what would be his masterpiece, but also bringing home his momentous idea for the telegraph. Harriet Beecher Stowe traveled to Paris to escape the controversy generated by her book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Three of the greatest American artists ever—sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens, painters Mary Cassatt and John Singer Sargent—flourished in Paris, inspired by French masters.

Almost forgotten today, the heroic American ambassador Elihu Washburne bravely remained at his post through the Franco-Prussian War, the long Siege of Paris, and the nightmare of the Commune. His vivid diary account of the starvation and suffering endured by the people of Paris is published here for the first time.

Telling their stories with power and intimacy, McCullough brings us into the lives of remarkable men and women who, in Saint-Gaudens’ phrase, longed “to soar into the blue.”

I didn't finish it.

Would you try another book from David McCullough and/or Edward Herrmann?

no.

What was your reaction to the ending? (No spoilers please!)

don't know, didn't finish it.

Have you listened to any of Edward Herrmann’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I haven't listened to others and probably won't I had expected more interesting people and more intrigue, relationships or plot. Seemed like a book of short stories of not so interesting people.

Do you think The Greater Journey needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

I'd expected a book about the great artists who gathered in a Parisian café and to hear their conversations, see their lives and relationships. This read like a history book.

Thrilling tales of young Americans in Paris

I couldn’t possibly say enough good things about this book. The story of young wildly talented Americans in their early years learning their trades - artists and orators, surgeons and inventors, sculptors and others - what gloriously told tales of their lives and how they became the great men and women of young America. I could listen all over again right this minute.

Recognizable characters but many new

A bit disjointed but very educational Reading was fine but a little flat. Maybe appropriate for type of book.

Superb Preparation for Historical Visit To Paris

For those of us not familiar with French, audible translation of conversations would have been helpful

How years in Paris stretched influential Americans

True confession: I love listening to David McCullough narrate his own books. With the voice of a story-teller and the research of a historian, McCullough introduces us to the journeys of several key American figures who studied in Paris before they were well-known. The hardships and education they found in this beautiful city stretched them in ways that prepared them for later greatness.