BARCK OBAMA

"More novel than short story, more ballad than poem -- writers agree that restraint and plain speaking were the qualities that distinguished President Obama's inaugural address. Long on plot (and it will thicken), it did what literature does best: the backward glance, the standing on shoulders, the salute to ancestors and other sources of wisdom."

"He is our first (in the best sense of the word) aristocratic president," author and journalist Malcolm Gladwell told The Times. "Bush was a buddy. Clinton was the kindly uncle. Obama is a prince."