Pulitzer Prize-Winning Biographer Offers a Unique Perspective on Franklin, France, and the Birth of America

March 08, 2005

Stacy Schiff

When Benjamin Franklin traveled to France in 1776, he had already made his mark as a statesman, scientist, inventor, printer, and philosopher. "At the time he set foot on French soil Benjamin Franklin was among the most famous men in the world," writes Stacy Schiff in The Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America (Henry Holt). But Franklin's most vital service to his country would come during the eight years he spent in France. During that time, the charismatic and naturally diplomatic Philadelphian convinced France to bankroll America's independence. Franklin persuaded the French to join America's fight against the British during the Revolutionary War and provide much-needed funding. "Without French funds, the Revolution would have collapsed," Schiff writes.

In this April Book Sense Notable title, the author covers these eight crucial years with engaging, stylish prose and suspenseful drama. "I was very aware of the fact that the story should be plot driven," the author told BTW in a recent interview. "Franklin essentially goes on a mission, an adventure: the question becomes, does he succeed or does he not succeed? It was essential that the narrative pull the reader through in some way."

And it was appealing, not to mention challenging, for Schiff to provide great detail on a small but immensely important slice of Franklin's life. "There were moments where I thought, he did this, he did that, but does this and that matter? she said with a laugh.

Well, much of it did matter a great deal. "There are two and a half times as much documentation for these eight years than as for the entire rest of his life," Schiff noted. "And the documentation is extremely revealing. It's lovely, in that it's a part of his life that's immensely documented yet little explored."

To conduct her exploration, Schiff -- like her subject -- sojourned to France. The bulk of the material she mined was located in the French State Department's archives in Paris. "We moved the family over to Paris for a year to do this," said Schiff, who is bilingual. "I have three kids, so I wasn't sure I could handle the project at first. But it was an obsession that kept gnawing at me.

"Of course, everybody said I was lucky to go to Paris, but researching in French archives can be rather complicated," she continued. "All of the conversations about Franklin, with Franklin, Franklin's letters back to America which were intercepted, everything is there. And all of this material has rarely been mined by anyone other than diplomatic historians."

Posing a problem at times was the immensely eccentric French penmanship of many documents. Take, for example, the writings of Marquis de Lafayette, a Frenchman who became an American general and commander during the Battle of Yorktown.

"I've said this before as a joke, but it's not really a joke: There's actually very little of Lafayette in the book because I just can't read his handwriting," said Schiff. Thankfully, however, the penmanship of her main subject, Franklin, is "blessedly clear and easy. And nobody writes like Franklin in English. He has such an impossibly clear writing style. He's just a delight to spend time with, eloquent, and always approachable."

Schiff also found a great deal of material in London's British Library. The French and the British conducted extensive surveillance on Franklin, and "the British spy stuff is heavenly," she observed. "And some of that material does include the day-to-day detail, like 'Franklin looks depressed today.' Other research I did from a distance because I obviously couldn't get myself to, say, Venice. It would have been nice to have gone to Venice to do a little research, wouldn't it have?"

About Franklin's considerable diplomatic skills, Schiff observed that among his contemporaries in government, "he's the only one who's truly a diplomat. And about his charisma: "He had a certain charm that certainly John Adams and other American Patriots lacked, but he's as shrewd and manipulative as is imaginable. He hides it particularly well, though. Franklin's cardinal rule was, never contradict anyone. And if that isn't the first rule of diplomacy, I don't know what is. He also had an amazing ability to remain silent, which is a great negotiating tactic, and he commits relatively little to paper, which also seems to be a very capable way of proceeding diplomatically. He's always able to remain extremely flexible and extremely congenial."

Civic spirit was also a large part of Franklin's character. "Here was someone who held such an immense belief in progress but wouldn't patent his inventions; that way as many people as possible could profit from them. There was just a base generosity that was hugely appealing."

Meanwhile, Franklin had an edge over many of his colleagues, Schiff believes, because he had already left his mark on the world. "His colleagues, who are all men half his age, aren't able to remain as serene and stately as he does, and they bungle things. Whereas Franklin, because he's able to sort of stay above the fray and play by European rules -- which are more complicated and also more slippery than what the Americans were used to -- is able actually to get things done."

Franklin's desire to get things done put him in good standing with French entrepreneur Jacques-Donatien Le Ray De Chaumont, the principal private supplier of American aid.

"Chaumont is a doer, a born entrepreneur, so the two of them get off on the right foot because of a shared interest in accomplishing things. And Chaumont has a real passion for American democracy -- in the experiment of democracy. He really doesn't like his gilded world of titles and privilege. Because of his connections, he's able to fix Franklin up with the right suppliers, the right uniform person, the right person for munitions, etc."

Schiff is also the author of Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) (Modern Library), which won the Pulitzer Prize for biography in 2000, and Saint-Exupery (Da Capo), which was a finalist for the 1995 Pulitzer Prize. She compared the approaches she took for A Great Improvisation and Vera in an intriguing way: "Franklin's French period appealed to me largely because it is the story of the American revolution, but the story told from the opposite side, the unknown side of the tapestry," she said. "And in truth, that was how I had always thought of Vera. It was the story of Nabokov, told from the reverse side." --Jeff Perlah

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