Pass My Imperfections Lightly By

Mary Todd Lincoln is an enigma to most people. All that is remembered of the woman is that she was a shrew and eventually was committed to an insane asylum. But that definition is much too simple. There were other sides to this complex personality. Her awareness of the political pulse of this country was instrumental in the election of her husband as president. Her ego-driven idea of what the leader of a nation should be changed the White House from a "countrified plantation" into a figurehead residence fit for a president. She was an emancipated woman long before her husband began the emancipation of another minority. The final horror of her husband's death and her incarceration as insane are re-lived by a woman, not an historical figure. For all her faults, Mary Todd Lincoln was in many was the first first lady, a woman who insisted that her voice be heard. Pass My Imperfections Lightly By is a dramatic examination of a unique personality which history tends to simplify.