Tuesday lecture with Charlotte Gray
Summer Lecture Series
August 20, 2024
11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Charlotte Gray is one of Canada’s best-known writers and the author of twelve acclaimed books of literary nonfiction. Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons (2023) explores the lives of Sara Delano, mother of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Jennie Jerome, mother of Winston Churchill, both of whom refused to settle into predictable, sheltered lives as little-known wives of prominent men. Instead, both women took control of their destinies, concentrating much of their energies on preparing their sons for powerful leadership positions on the world stage. Impeccably researched and filled with intriguing social insights, Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons is a story of loyalty and resilience. Gray’s book breathes new life into Sara and Jennie, offering a fascinating and fulsome portrait of how leaders are not just born but made.
Interested in becoming a Mount Member? Join today!
The Mount is a Massachusetts Cultural Council UP designated organization welcoming participants of all disabilities. Please contact The Mount at 413-551-5100 or by email, info@edithwharton.org, to discuss accommodations needed to participate fully in this event. The Mount's Health and Safety Guidelines can be found here.
Thanks to our sponsors:
Linda Saul-Sena
Mark Sena
Carol Haythorne
Mary Copeland
- Sales for all lectures will open for Mount Members on Monday, May 13, and to the general public on Wednesday, May 15. Prices are $15 (Mount Members) and $20 (General Admission). All lectures and panel discussions are free for graduate and undergraduate students, and children under 18. Check back to book online!
- All lectures will take place in an outdoor, open-sided tent. We look forward to seeing you rain or shine.
- Books are available for purchase through The Mount's Bookstore before and during the event.
Charlotte Gray is one of Canada’s best-known writers and the author of twelve acclaimed books of literary nonfiction, including The Promise of Canada (2026). Her bestseller The Massey Murder: A Maid, Her Master, and the Trial That Shocked a Country (2013) won the Toronto Book Award, the Heritage Toronto Book Award, the Canadian Authors Association Lela Common Award for Canadian History, and the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Nonfiction Crime Book. It was shortlisted for the RBC Taylor Prize, the Ottawa Book Award for Nonfiction, and the Evergreen Award, and longlisted for the British Columbia National Award for Canadian Nonfiction. An adaptation of her bestseller Gold Diggers: Striking It Rich in the Klondike (2010) was broadcast as a television miniseries. An adjunct research professor in the Department of History at Carleton University, Gray has received numerous awards, including the Pierre Berton Award for distinguished achievement in popularizing Canadian history. She is a Member of the Order of Canada and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
Photo: Michelle Valberg
—Margaret MacMillan, New York Times bestselling author of Paris 1919 and War
“This is a spectacular book, brilliantly and magnetically written. It’s a story about the passionate love of two remarkable mothers and their two remarkable sons, but it’s also transcendently about all mothers and their sons.”
—Rosalie Abella, former Canadian Supreme Court justice and professor of law at Harvard Law School
“Entirely original and brilliant. Gray weaves together the parallel lives of Sara Roosevelt and Jennie Churchill, as wives as well as mothers, and explores their fascinatingly dissimilar guidance of their famous sons’ futures. Fresh, original, superbly researched, and immensely readable.”
—Ronald Cohen, C.M., MBE, author of the three-volume Bibliography of the Writings of Sir Winston Churchill