The study of history is a quest for understanding what it means to be human, according to renowned historian H. W. Brands.
For nearly 40 years, the New York Times bestselling author and University of Texas at Austin professor has engaged and enlightened scores of students and readers about America’s past with his rich explorations of human nature and the challenges of human existence in his thought-provoking lectures and books.
“There are few human challenges more universal than dealing with the death of a loved one,” wrote Brands for a June 12, 2024, post on A User’s Guide to History for substack.com. “Those of us who are spared this trial are those who themselves die early, becoming the object of grief rather than the subject. Long life is judged a blessing, and so it is. But one of its drawbacks is the greater grief it exposes us to.”
In his poignant post, titled “The wounds that never heal,” Brands explores the universal anguish of a parent losing a child by recounting the heartbreaking story of Congressman Henry Clay through a letter he wrote to his wife in December 1835 about the death of their daughter.
Brands often uses excerpts from diaries, journals and letters to bring the voices of the past to life.
“I try to put my readers inside the heads of my subjects. That’s what makes a good story, whether fiction or nonfiction,” says Brands, who will be in Tulsa Dec. 5-6 to receive the 2024 Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award, given by the Tulsa City-County Library and Tulsa Library Trust.
Since 1988, the prolific author has written nearly 40 books on U.S. history, economics and foreign affairs, including The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin and Traitor to His Class: The Privileged Life and Radical Presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, which both were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. His most recent works are Founding Partisans: Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, Adams and the Brawling Birth of American Politics (2023) and America First: Roosevelt vs. Lindbergh in the Shadow of War (2024).
Brands’ in-depth knowledge of American history is almost seamless. He has written on a plethora of historical figures and subjects, ranging from Andrew Jackson to Ronald Reagan, the California Gold Rush to the Cold War.
“There are lots of stories I’d like to tell,” says the writer, who always has a work in progress.
When asked how he finds the time to both teach and write all those books, Brands says his teaching reinforces his writing and vice versa.
“Because I teach broadly about the subjects I write about specifically, the writing and the teaching are mutually supportive,” he says.
If Brands could go back in time and actually meet one of the many historical figures featured in his books, he said he would pick William Sherman, a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
He was a “brilliant, tormented man who had something interesting to say on most topics,” says Brands.
The 2024 Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award Featuring H. W. Brands
Free Public Presentation and Book Signing
Dec. 5, 5:30 p.m.
Author Presentation at Black-Tie Gala
Dec. 6, 6 p.m.
Location:
Central Library
Fifth Street and Denver Ave., Tulsa
Visit tulsalibrary.org/helmerich-award for more details.
