This is a biography composed as it should be. It tells the life chronolgically, discussing poems as Bryant wrote them and telling of his life as editor and traveller. I decided to read Bryant's biography because I have long revelled in his poem "I Cannot Forget With What Fervent Devotion" which includes the felicitous lines:
'Mong the deep-cloven fells that for ages had listened
To the rush of the pebble-paved river between,
Where the kingfisher screamed and gray precipice glistened,
All breathless with awe have I gazed on the scene;

The only flaw in the book is that this poem is not mentioned! ( )