Friday, January 25, 2019

PENNSYLVANIA: Penn biography

Readers interested in Colonial history might enjoy getting a copy of "William Penn: A Life" by Rutgers University professor Andrew Murphy, just released by the Oxford University Press. The Chester County Library System has two copies you can check out.
I had the pleasure of copy-editing the manuscript last February and learned a lot about not only Penn as a human, a devout Quaker and an administrator but also the history of our area and Quakerism.
The Wall Street Journal reviewer called the book "admirable" but noted that Murphy "has not quite managed to transform that life in to a page-turner." It is a scholarly book with a lot of footnotes and details, including Penn's lifelong financial problems, but the fact that the subject is close to us certainly adds a great deal of interest.

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