A short life of the author
Michael Joseph Shaara Jr. (23 June 1928 – 5 May 1988) was an American novelist and short story writer whose historical novel The Killer Angels (1974) — a vivid, psychologically complex account of the three days of the Battle of Gettysburg told from the perspectives of the commanders on both sides — won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and is widely regarded as the finest American Civil War novel ever written. The book was adapted into the 1993 film Gettysburg, directed by Ronald F. Maxwell, which brought Shaara’s vision of the battle to a vast new audience.
Life
Shaara was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, of Italian-American descent (the family name was originally Sciarra). He served in the 82nd Airborne Division, attended Rutgers University, and held a variety of jobs — merchant seaman, police officer, paratrooper, short story writer. He published science fiction stories in Galaxy, Astounding, and other magazines in the 1950s, and his first novel, The Broken Place (1968), about a Korean War veteran, was well received but did not sell.
He was a professor of creative writing at Florida State University. A heart attack in 1975 and subsequent health problems plagued his later years. He died at fifty-nine, having published only three novels.
The Killer Angels (1974)
The novel covers the three days of the Battle of Gettysburg (1–3 July 1863) through the viewpoints of the commanders: Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain of the 20th Maine (who held the Union left flank on Little Round Top), General Robert E. Lee (whose decision to attack despite unfavourable ground led to catastrophe), General James Longstreet (Lee’s chief lieutenant, who opposed the assault and was proven right), and General John Buford (the cavalry commander who chose the ground).
Shaara’s achievement is to make the reader experience the battle from inside the minds of the men who fought it — their calculations, their fears, their exhaustion, their sense of duty and honour. The novel is not a military history but a work of psychological fiction: Chamberlain’s desperate bayonet charge down Little Round Top, Lee’s serene and fatal certainty, Longstreet’s agonised obedience to orders he knows are wrong — these are rendered with a novelistic intensity that no conventional history can match.
The prose is spare, muscular, and rhythmically powerful. Shaara writes combat with a clarity that puts the reader on the field — the smoke, the noise, the confusion, the sudden intimacy of close-quarters fighting. He treats both Union and Confederate soldiers with respect, presenting the war not as a morality play but as a catastrophe in which brave men on both sides were consumed.
The novel was rejected by fifteen publishers before being accepted by David McKay Company, received mostly positive reviews, won the Pulitzer Prize, and then went out of print. It was rediscovered and reissued in the late 1980s and became a perennial bestseller after the film adaptation.
The Film: Gettysburg (1993)
Ronald F. Maxwell’s four-hour film — with Jeff Daniels as Chamberlain, Martin Sheen as Lee, and Tom Berenger as Longstreet — was remarkably faithful to Shaara’s novel and became one of the most widely watched Civil War films. It was originally produced for television but received a theatrical release.
Other Work
The Broken Place (1968) is a novel about a Korean War veteran struggling with PTSD. For Love of the Game (published posthumously, 1991) is a short novel about an aging baseball pitcher’s perfect game, adapted into a 1999 film starring Kevin Costner.
Shaara’s son, Jeff Shaara, wrote prequel and sequel novels — Gods and Generals (1996) and The Last Full Measure (1998) — that extended the Gettysburg narrative, though neither achieved the literary quality of his father’s work.
Collecting Shaara
The Killer Angels (1974, David McKay) in first edition with dust jacket is one of the most sought-after modern American first editions, bringing $2,000–$8,000. The book had a small first printing, and copies in fine condition are genuinely rare. The Broken Place (1968) brings $50–$150.