The Theodore Roosevelt Collection

The Greatman’s Library Theodore Roosevelt Collection brings together the books that informed, accompanied, and reflected the life of one of America’s most energetic statesmen. It includes the histories, biographies, natural studies, political writings, and works of literature that Roosevelt read, admired, and often quoted throughout his career.

The collection spans the breadth of Roosevelt’s interests — from classical epics and military histories to American frontier narratives and works on natural science. It highlights the authors who shaped his worldview: the statesmen and historians of antiquity, the moral philosophers of the 18th and 19th centuries, the naturalists whose writings inspired his conservationist outlook, and the novelists who captured the virtues of courage, endurance, and character.

Alongside these are works on strategy, exploration, and governance, reflecting Roosevelt’s practical engagement with politics and public life. His own reading habits reveal a man deeply immersed in both the lessons of history and the beauty of literature, with books serving as a constant companion in war, peace, travel, and office.

What’s Covered in The Greatman’s Library: Theodore Roosevelt Collection

Classical & Historical Foundations

• Ancient historians — Herodotus, Thucydides, Livy, Tacitus
• Military and political thought — Xenophon, Polybius, Caesar
• The Greco-Roman literary tradition — Homer, Virgil, Plutarch

American Literature & Frontier Narratives

• Early American history and exploration
• Works of James Fenimore Cooper and frontier romance
• Accounts of wilderness travel, hunting, and natural life
• National epics and patriotic literature

Political & Moral Philosophy

• Enlightenment thinkers — Locke, Montesquieu, Rousseau
• Nineteenth-century political writers — Burke, Mill, Tocqueville
• Studies in governance, democracy, and reform
• Writings on duty, citizenship, and moral character

Natural History & Science

• Studies of wildlife and natural environments
• Ornithological and zoological works
• Explorations of the American wilderness and beyond
• Scientific approaches to ecology and conservation

Nineteenth-Century Literature

• British and European novelists — Scott, Dickens, Eliot, Tolstoy
• American authors — Hawthorne, Emerson, Thoreau, Longfellow
• Works embodying themes of struggle, endurance, and virtue

Biographies & Military Histories

• Lives of great commanders and statesmen
• Campaign accounts from antiquity to the Napoleonic age
• Naval histories and studies of seapower
• Explorers, adventurers, and national heroes