Bill Clinton: by Nigel Hamilton

About Nigel

Born in 1944 in Alnmouth, Northumberland, Nigel Hamilton was made Britain's first Professor of Biography. Educated at Westminster School, Munich University and Trinity College, Cambridge University, Nigel was married in 1966 and founded the Greenwich Bookshop in that year. His first work, Royal Greenwich, co-written with his mother, Olive Hamilton, won a design award and set new standards for topographical literature.
In 1973, Nigel's first wife, Hannelore, died, leaving him with two small children to raise. In 1976, he remarried, this time taking a Finnish wife, Outi, by whom he had two further boys. His 1978 study of the lives of Heinrich and Thomas Mann, The Brothers Mann, was highly acclaimed on both sides of the Atlantic. It was followed in 1981, 1983 and 1986 by his 3-volume epic life of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery: Monty, which won the Whitbread Award, the Templer Medal for Military History and (for the BBC documentary profile, based on the biography) the 1988 New York Blue Ribbon Award.
Moving to the United States in 1988 after the death of his father, Sir Denis Hamilton, Nigel embarked on a new life of President John F. Kennedy. He was appointed The John F. Kennedy Scholar at the University of Massachusetts at Boston in 1989, taught history as a visiting professor in the university’s History department for a number of years, and became a visiting fellow in the university’s John W. McCormack Institute of Public Policy. In 1992 Nigel’s JFK: Reckless Youth was published by Random House. Though denounced by members of the Kennedy family as 'Reckless Biography' in a New York Times Op-Ed, it nevertheless became a bestseller and instant classic: a serious, scholarly, yet compulsively readable and engaging account of the education and early years of the 35th President. The book was dramatized by Bill Broyles and filmed for ABC television in 1993, with Patrick Dempsey in the title role.
Returning to the UK in 1994, Nigel devoted himself to his passion: the history of twentieth-century biography, which he taught in the History Department first at Royal Holloway college, University of London, then at De Montfort University, Leicester. His inaugural public lecture, 'The Art of Subversion: Biography in the Twentieth Century', was delivered in May, 2000.
The British Institute of Biography, which Nigel founded in 1996, was an English charity, set up to promote and foster all aspects of biography, in all media, for the public good. It fundraised for the creation of an international biographical center in Britain - the Biorama Real Lives center - and spawned a dedicated company training postgraduate students to compile lives of historical and contemporary figures, in all fields, for the Internet: Real-lives.com.
Nigel's love of teaching, education and literature shine through his work as through his life. His book The Full Monty: Montgomery of Alamein 1887 - 1942 brought the first volume of his official biography up to date for the millennium, but included the perspective of Montgomery's bisexual orientation - for long the cause of rumor and speculation. It was published to high praise in Britain by Penguin Press in 2001.
In the fall of 2000, meanwhile, Nigel returned to Boston as a visiting fellow in the John W. McCormack Institute, University of Massachusetts Boston (recently renamed The John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies), in order to undertake a new Life of President William Jefferson Clinton. The first volume, Bill Clinton: An American Journey was published by Random House in the U.S. and the U.K. in the fall of 2003, and translated into a number of languages.
While researching and writing the second volume of his biography of Bill Clinton, Nigel was able to write a book he had longed to tackle: Biography – A Brief History, which was published to great acclaim by Harvard University Press in the spring of 2007. Simultaneously Potomac Books, which specializes in military literature, published Nigel’s Montgomery: D-Day Commander – considered the best short account of Field-Marshal Montgomery’s contribution to the winning of World War II in Europe.
In July 2007 Nigel’s much awaited second Clinton volume was published by PublicAffairs as Bill Clinton: Mastering the Presidency. Nigel will be speaking about the volume, which covers President Clinton’s tumultuous first term in the Oval Office, in numerous venues across the country, including the Carter Center.
Works in Progress: Nigel has just completed the manuscript of How To Do Biography: A Primer, which will be published by Harvard University Press in the spring of 2008. He has also been commissioned by The Bodley Head, a division of Random House UK, to undertake a modern version of Suetonius’ classic biographical work The Twelve Caesars (depicted the twelve Roman emperors from Julius Caesar to Domitian). Nigel’s new version will be called American Caesars, and cover the last twelve American presidents, from Franklin Roosevelt to George W. Bush. It will be published in 2010. He will undertake the third and final volume of his Clinton trilogy after completion of American Caesars.
Nigel was married for a third time in 2006. His wife Dr. Raynel Shepard is Curriculum Developer for the Boston Public Schools, and an adjunct professor in the education department of Boston College.