The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Christopher Bing

In his magnificent interpretation of Henry Wadsworth Longfellows poem, Christopher Bing seamlessly weaves history and imagination into a rich portrait of an American hero. A meticulous researcher, Bing includes material that provides texture to history, maps that follow the British campaign to quell the rebellious citizenry, as well as the patriots ride into the Massachusetts night of April, 1775. Documents firmly affixed into the book, including the British generals orders to his troops and Reveres own deposition relating the events, give the reader not only a visual experience but a tactile one as well. Far more than a brilliantly presented history lesson, this book represents a tour de force of coherent artistic vision. In an extraordinary series of rich and moody engravings, from the mysteriously shimmering rigging of the British sloop, The Somerset, looming in a moonlit Boston harbor to the taut urgency of a man and his horse galloping at a combustible moment in the American experience, this book illuminates our countrys past unlike any other.