Baden-Powell

Blurb

Baden-Powell is a 1989 biography of Robert Baden-Powell by Tim Jeal. Tim Jeal's work, researched over five years, was first published by Hutchinson in the UK and Yale University Press . It was reviewed by the New York Times. As James Casada writes in his review for Library Journal, it is "a balanced, definitive assessment which so far transcends previous treatments as to make them almost meaningless."
Although Jeal's Baden-Powell "transcends previous treatments" and is exceptionally well referenced, as a "balanced, definitive assessment" it has come under criticism. Academic books and articles on Baden-Powell had become critical and negative since the 1960s culminating in Michael Rosenthal's 1986 The Character Factory. Jeal's biographies restored the reputations of British imperial era figures such as David Livingstone and so Jeal did with Baden-Powell. Jeal relied predominantly on material from the established scout organizations and from Baden-Powell's own writings, diaries and correspondence. The people and organizations behind the commissioning, editing and publishing of Jeal's Baden-Powell are also of interest in the balance of the book.