{"id":7405,"date":"2015-02-13T14:15:00","date_gmt":"2015-02-13T22:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/stories\/grotesque-yet-beloved\/"},"modified":"2024-09-04T15:42:32","modified_gmt":"2024-09-04T22:42:32","slug":"grotesque-yet-beloved","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/stories\/grotesque-yet-beloved\/","title":{"rendered":"Grotesque yet beloved: the fascination with Abraham Lincoln\u2019s body"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n    \n                                \n\n  \n    \n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div\n  class=\"cc--component-container cc--article-hero \"\n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  >\n  <div class=\"c--component c--article-hero\"\n    \n      >\n\n    \n<div class=\"inner-wrapper\">\n          \n<div class=\"f--field f--image\">\n\n    \n    \n    \n    \n    \n    \n              \n      <img\n                            data-src=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2015\/02\/lincoln_fox_top-768x432.jpg\"\n          data-srcset=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2015\/02\/lincoln_fox_top-1920x1080.jpg 1920w,https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2015\/02\/lincoln_fox_top-1280x720.jpg 1280w,https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2015\/02\/lincoln_fox_top-768x432.jpg 768w\"          data-sizes=\"(min-width:1200px) 75vw, (min-width:768px) 83vw, 100vw\"          class=\"lazyload\"\n        \n                  alt=\"A portrait of Abraham Lincoln\"\n        \n        \n                                      \/>\n\n    \n    \n  \n  \n\n<\/div>\n  \n      <div class=\"image-caption\">\n          \n<div class=\"f--field f--description\">\n\n    \n  (Photo: Alexander Gardner\/ Library of Congress.)\n\n\n<\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  \n  <div class=\"text-wrapper\">\n          <nav aria-label=\"Breadcrumb\" class=\"breadcrumbs\">\n        <ul>\n                      <li><a href=\"\/news\/stories\/\">News<\/a><\/li>\n                      <li><a href=\"\/news\/stories\/\/?category=faculty\">Faculty<\/a><\/li>\n                  <\/ul>\n      <\/nav>\n    \n              \n<div class=\"f--field f--page-title\">\n\n    \n  <h1>Grotesque yet beloved: the fascination with Abraham Lincoln\u2019s body<\/h1>\n\n\n<\/div>\n    \n          <div class=\"subtitle\">\n            \n<div class=\"f--field f--description\">\n\n    \n  Richard Fox\u2019s new book on Abraham Lincoln views the former president\u2019s impact through the lens of his looks, his accessibility and his sacrifice.\n\n\n<\/div>\n      <\/div>\n    \n           <strong class=\"author-field\"><span >By<\/span><a href=\"mailto:communication@dornsife.usc.edu\">Susan Bell<\/a><\/strong>\n    \n          <span class=\"post-date-field\">February 13, 2015<\/span>\n      <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n  <\/div><\/div>\n\n  \n    \n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div\n 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0l7.2857142-6.34285719c-.0857142-.08571428-.2571428-.08571428-.4285714-.08571428zm-1.28571428 1.11428567v.1714286 8.5714286c0 .6857143.6 1.2857143 1.28571428 1.2857143h14.57142856c.6857143 0 1.2857143-.6 1.2857143-1.2857143v-8.5714286c0-.0857143 0-.0857143 0-.1714286l-7.2 6.3428572c-.7714286.6857143-1.8857143.6857143-2.6571429 0z\" fill-rule=\"evenodd\" transform=\"translate(-6 -9)\"\/><\/svg>\n            <\/span>\n            <span class=\"a2a_label visually-hidden\">Email<\/span>\n          <\/a>\n                  <\/span>\n  <\/div>\n\n  <\/div><\/div>\n \n\n\n\n  \n    \n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div\n  class=\"cc--component-container cc--rich-text \"\n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  >\n  <div class=\"c--component c--rich-text\"\n    \n      >\n\n    \n      \n<div class=\"f--field f--wysiwyg\">\n\n    \n  <p>Speaking to an 1856 convention of newspaper editors in Decatur, Illinois, Abraham Lincoln, never at a loss for a humorous quip or story, told this amusing tale.<\/p>\n<p>While riding a horse through the woods, a man Lincoln described as \u201cnot possessed of features the ladies would call handsome,\u201d stopped on the path to let a woman rider pass.<\/p>\n<p>She stopped in turn and said, \u201cWell, for land sake, you are the homeliest man I ever saw.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYes, madam, but I cannot help it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo I suppose not,\u201d she said, \u201cbut you might stay at home.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/profile\/richard-fox\/\">Richard Fox<\/a>, professor of <a href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/hist\/\">history<\/a> at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, recounts this anecdote in his new book <a href=\"https:\/\/wwnorton.com\/books\/Lincolns-Body\/\"><em>Lincoln\u2019s Body: A Cultural History<\/em> <\/a>(W.W. Norton &amp; Company, 2015). The tale, reported decades later by one of those present, was thought to be a \u201cpersonal reminiscence\u201d on the part of Lincoln.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 225px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/migration-uploads\/Lincolns-Body_225x334-1979.jpg\" alt=\"Book cover which says &quot;Lincoln's Body: A Cultural History.&quot;\" width=\"225\" height=\"342\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Richard Wightman Fox\u2019s new book on Lincoln traces our preoccupation with his physical form, from legendary emancipator, to a glorified symbol of nationhood.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Examining images, speeches, monuments, Hollywood movies, and many other sources, Fox charts the ways Americans have remembered and imagined Lincoln and used his physical presence as a vehicle for evaluating Lincoln\u2019s continuing impact on American culture.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDuring Lincoln\u2019s lifetime, everybody was preoccupied with his looks and that meant his physical appearance, as well as the way he dressed, the way he carried his body,\u201d Fox said. \u201cWhen people used the word grotesque to describe him \u2014 and that was an adjective used by friends as well as foes \u2014 they meant not hideous, but uncanny or alien.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In his book, Fox explores how Lincoln used his innate gift for humor and storytelling to make light of what everyone concurred was his unfortunate physical frame. He was thereby able to overcome what might have been a serious handicap, even turning his gift for comical self-depreciation to his advantage as a political tool. \u201cMillions were inspired by Lincoln\u2019s knowing how to overcome the unfortunate hand nature had dealt him,\u201d Fox writes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe himself thought he\u2019d been dealt a poor hand in personal looks, but it never stopped him,\u201d Fox said. \u201cI think that\u2019s why millions of people found him so endearing, because he would make fun of his own appearance. Some of his most humorous remarks are about it and that, of course, made him irresistible.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As a result, despite the jokes and the insults \u2014 or perhaps because of them \u2014 Lincoln\u2019s body, all six foot, four inches of it, occupied a unique place in the hearts and minds of Americans for generations.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 225px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/migration-uploads\/lincoln08-hair-225x300-1979.jpg\" alt=\"Abraham Lincoln looks to the side. His hair is tousled and he's wearing a bow tie.\" width=\"225\" height=\"300\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This beloved photograph of Lincoln by Alexander Hesler, a silver gelatin print taken on Feb. 28, 1857 in Chicago, shows the future president as a homely, unpretentious man \u2014 a man of the people. (Photo: Alexander Hesler\/ Library of Congress.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>However, by the 1970s, this obsession with Lincoln\u2019s appearance \u2014 and the use to which he had put his body \u2014 was fading, to be replaced in the 1990s with a fixation on his words. Fox credits Daniel Day Lewis\u2019s performance in Steven Spielberg\u2019s 2012 film <em>Lincoln<\/em> with reviving interest in Lincoln\u2019s looks, accessibility and physical sacrifice \u2014and in confirming his role as an emancipator.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMost people pay little conscious attention to Lincoln\u2019s body these days, but once they focus on it they can see how it\u2019s been tied to his words and deeds ever since he entered politics,\u201d Fox writes. Lincoln\u2019s physical being fascinated his contemporaries, as well as following generations, he argues, because they realized how much it mattered to him.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLincoln made people care about [his body] by tying it to their national saga,\u201d Fox writes in his book. \u201cOnly in America was self-making possible on such a grand scale, he kept saying, and only in America, was a man like him \u2014 of such unprepossessing origins, in appearance and social standing \u2014 able to rise to such heights of power and respect.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After commencing his book with an examination of the importance of Lincoln\u2019s looks, Fox moves on to what he calls \u201cthe second dimension\u201d \u2014 the accessibility of Lincoln\u2019s body, in life and in death.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe had learned early on from Illinois politics in the 1830s and \u201940s that if he could get people into the same room with him, they stopped seeing ugliness in his face because they reveled in his animation,\u201d Fox said, noting the transformation of Lincoln\u2019s appearance when he engaged in conversation, or delivered speeches.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, his desire to mingle with the people \u2014 to show them they were living not in a monarchy, but in a republic, where leaders ultimately go back to being average citizens once their terms of office end, Fox argues, increased his chances of being attacked.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 350px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/migration-uploads\/Richmond-350x225-1979.jpg\" alt=\"An engraving shows Abe Lincoln walking through a crowd, holding hands with his 12-year-old son. \" width=\"350\" height=\"225\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">On April 4, 1865, 10 days before his assassination, Lincoln walked through the streets of Richmond, VA, hand-in-hand with his 12 year-old son and surrounded by thousands of slaves now free to welcome their emancipator. (Image: Alexander Hesler\/ Library of Congress.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Thus the historian believes that a now almost forgotten event that occurred 10 days before his assassination can help advance our understanding of Lincoln. It shows that for him republicanism was a way of living, not just a doctrine.<\/p>\n<p>The Civil War was almost over in Virginia when Confederate troops withdrew from Richmond during the night of April 2-3, 1865. On April 4, Lincoln arrived in the city and walked through the streets surrounded by thousands of slaves who were, in practice, now free to welcome their emancipator.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t think we can begin to imagine how that felt to the slaves of Virginia,\u201d Fox said. \u201cTheir liberator had arrived in their midst. And Lincoln made that happen himself. He could have waited at the dock for an army vehicle. But instead, protected only by the mariners who had rowed him ashore, he walked out into the streets, hand-in-hand with his 12 year-old son, Tad, with the crowd growing bigger minute by minute. The spring afternoon was hot and smoky, because the ruins of Richmond were still smoldering, but he trekked through the downtown all the way up to the former Confederate White House, which was now Union army headquarters.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This moment, Fox maintains, underscores Lincoln\u2019s accessibility and what some later perceived as his vulnerability.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI never expected that a Republican friend of Lincoln would blame him for his own assassination, but that\u2019s what happened,\u201d Fox said. \u201cHenry Raymond, the editor of <em>The New York Times<\/em>, wrote in the paper on the day that Lincoln\u2019s corpse arrived in Manhattan that Lincoln was \u2018culpably remiss\u2019 in making himself so accessible that he could be shot. In fact, Raymond said he was \u2018far more surprised that [Lincoln] was not assassinated months or years ago, than that he did at last perish by the hand\u2019 of John Wilkes Booth.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 350px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/migration-uploads\/Lincolns-death-350x225-1979.jpg\" alt=\"An engraving depicting Lincoln's death bed. He is surrounded by a crowd of mourning men.\" width=\"350\" height=\"225\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lincoln\u2019s death bed. (Image: Library of Congress.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Fox estimates that six million people saw the funeral train carrying Lincoln\u2019s body from Washington, D.C., to its final resting place in Springfield, Illinois, and another million people probably saw his face in death during the 12 different lyings-in-state in six states, plus the District of Columbia.<\/p>\n<p>By the end of the journey, anxious officials brought the funeral forward by two days, so worried were they by the rapid decomposition of Lincoln\u2019s corpse.<\/p>\n<p>Fox believes the accessibility of Lincoln\u2019s body in death echoed how he wanted himself to be accessible to all people during his lifetime.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn my book, I tried to present black experiences of Lincoln as being equal to white experiences,\u201d he said. \u201cI felt that was my responsibility since Lincoln was so clear about his commitment to natural equality and to greater civic equality.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n  \n        \n  \n    \n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div\n  class=\"cc--component-container cc--article-related-stories \"\n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  >\n  <div class=\"c--component c--article-related-stories\"\n    \n      >\n\n    \n  <div class=\"inner-wrapper\">\n    \n                  <article>\n              \n<div class=\"f--field f--cta-title\">\n\n    \n  <h3>\n          <a href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/stories\/thanksgiving-why-the-pilgrims-survived\/\" \n                        class=\"\" \n      >Why the Pilgrims were actually able to survive<\/a>\n      <\/h3>\n\n\n<\/div>\n        <\/article>\n              <article>\n              \n<div class=\"f--field f--cta-title\">\n\n    \n  <h3>\n          <a href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/stories\/american-revolution-starts-age-of-revolutions\/\" \n                        class=\"\" \n      >How the American quest for independence fueled a worldwide movement<\/a>\n      <\/h3>\n\n\n<\/div>\n        <\/article>\n              <article>\n              \n<div class=\"f--field f--cta-title\">\n\n    \n  <h3>\n          <a href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/news\/stories\/slaves-escape-via-underground-railroad-to-mexico\/\" \n                        class=\"\" \n      >Historian uncovers the Underground Railroad that ran to Mexico<\/a>\n      <\/h3>\n\n\n<\/div>\n        <\/article>\n            <\/div>\n\n\n  <\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Richard Fox\u2019s new book on Abraham Lincoln views the former president\u2019s impact through the lens of his looks, his accessibility and his sacrifice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":52,"featured_media":21347,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[55,71,75,938,919],"class_list":["post-7405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty","tag-books","tag-history","tag-humanities","tag-president","tag-richard-fox"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Grotesque yet beloved: the fascination with Abraham Lincoln\u2019s body<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A historian&#039;s book on Abraham Lincoln views the former president\u2019s impact through the lens of his looks, his accessibility and his sacrifice.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, 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