Another thing about Foote can be seen from how he uses epithets for people as though they are characters in an epic poem. Twenty-five years on, I still recall that he calls Sherman “red-haired.” He uses the epithet every.single.time Sherman is mentioned. Obviously if he’s using schtick from epic poetry in telling his history, it should ring warning bells about his historian bona fides.
My recollection is that in these books he’s a fiction writer telling a national epic in sparse language. He did research and took pains to get facts right, but the end result is lots of interesting characters playing their parts in a historical epic. I don’t recall any footnotes, though i thought he listed sources, maybe?
It may sound like I didn’t appreciate these books at all, but in some ways I did. The epithets rly help sort out who is who in a large, long story, and help the reader track the people like Sherman and Grant who he follows throughout. But is that kind of character-based historical enough for the given reader? is a fair question. In addition to questions raised about his received ideas on the causes of the war.
