Books & Culture's Book of the Week: Whose Independence?
All the Founding Fathers of America celebrated independence, but what the word meant depended on who was speaking.
Reviewed by Preston Jones | posted 10/01/2004 12:00AM
2 of 2
Washington's need for honor precluded the possibility of him being called "Farmer George," Morgan jokes; but neither was Washington so pompous as to accept John Adams' opinion that the president should be cloaked in the vocabulary of monarchy. "Your Highness" would not do.
Thus Washington manages to be both nicely American and aristocratically elusive. The battlefield mud on his shoes and the sweat of stress on his brow make him no less respectable. "Americans honor the father of their country from a respectful distance," Morgan says. "And that is surely the way Washington would have wanted it."
Out of the blocks, Morgan stumbles, seemingly forgetting that words have meanings. One doesn't know what to do with sentences like "John Adams was one of the vainest men who ever lived" or claims that Adams had an "almost psychopathic yearning to be thought a great man by everybody." Psychopathic? Everybody? One might have thought that editors would go after these musings, scissors in hand.
Fortunately, this sort of thing vanishes after the first ten pages, when the reader can settle in for a short but satisfying excursion through the revolutionary period and the first years of the republic.
Preston Jones, a contributing editor to Books & Culture, teaches at John Brown University.
Copyright © 2004 Christianity Today. Click
for reprint information.
Related Elsewhere:
The Meaning of Independence: John Adams, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson is available from Amazon.com and other book retailers.
Books & Culture Corner appears every Tuesday. Earlier editions of Books & Culture Corner and Book of the Week include:
Darkness Visible | An unsparing new memoir by the author of Slackjaw. (Oct. 05, 2004)
After Worldview? | A lively conference offers a state-of-the-art assessment of the concept of "worldview," with both advocates and dissenters represented. (Sept. 28, 2004)
A Forgotten Founder's Fatherhood | Race, nature, and patriarchy meet in Rhys Isaac's biography of early American diarist Landon Carter. (Sept. 21, 2004)
The Great American Hustle | The first volume of an ambitious new history of America highlights the engine of "worldly ideals"—and the role of evangelical religion in creating a distinctive American identity. (Sept. 14, 2004)
The Poet Who Remembered | Poland (mostly) honors Czeslaw Milosz upon his death. (Sept. 07, 2004)
Be Careful What You Pray For | The strange tale of the controversial Bishop Pike and his fatal quest for relevance. (Aug. 31, 2004)
Book 'Em! | The concluding installment of our three-part midyear book roundup (Aug. 24, 2004)
(Not Just) Summer Reading | Part 2 of our midyear report on outstanding books. (Aug. 17, 2004)
Real Fantasy | The first installment in a new Tolkien-inspired series shows genuine promise. (Aug. 17, 2004)
We've Got Books | The first installment of our new midyear book report. (Aug. 10, 2004)
'Be Happy!' | How the ancient Olympics differed from the modern spectacle. (Aug. 10, 2004)
Rediscovering 'Husbandry' | What Colonial farmers have to teach us about living with the land. (Aug. 03, 2004)
China's Spiritual Hunger | The lessons of Falun Gong (July 27, 2004)
RSS Feeds
Audio
Twitter
share this page
E-mail
Print
Post
Subscribe to Christianity Today magazine today!
