{"product_id":"the-road-to-khartoum-a-life-of-general-charles-gordon-9780880291521","title":"The Road to Khartoum: A Life of General Charles Gordon","description":"\u003cp\u003eOf all the British Empires peculiar champions  General Charles Gordon most exactly fulfilled the expectations and the heroic imaginings of the great public. He was brave; he was holy; he adventured in distant lands; he had marvelous eyes; and he died a martyrs death at Khartoum in the Sudan in 1884 when the English garrison was overrun by the Moslem fanatics of the Mahdi.  But if Gordon was flawless as a legend  those closer to him knew a different side of his personality. Gladstone  who in public referred to Gordon as a hero of heroes  was privately infuriated by his eccentricities and independence. He was a chain smoker  a heavy drinker  and ever since Lytton Stracheys shocking  debunking portrait in EMINENT VICTORIANS  the hint of homosexuality has been attached to Gordons name. Whereas Gordon once seemed a plaster saint  he appears to us now as something of a maverick. The unflinching courage might today be called neurosis  and even his simple  fundamentalist Christianity now seems to have its darker side.  In constructing this full-length  splendidly researched portrait of a many faceted man  Charles Chenevix Trench confronts the central fact of Gordons career and personality: the unaccountable fascination which he exercised over others. Time and again in these pages we meet men who were willing to uproot their lives and endure appalling hardships  just to follow Gordon: to China  to South Africa  to Khartoum. It was an extraordinary power  and simply by exerting it  Gordon  like T. E. Lawrence  influenced the course of world history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45646996045877,"sku":"ByrdShop_0880291524","price":113.22,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780880291521.jpg?v=1781684760","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/the-road-to-khartoum-a-life-of-general-charles-gordon-9780880291521","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}