Writing the rebellion : loyalists and the literature of politics in British America
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Writing the rebellion : loyalists and the literature of politics in British America
（Oxford studies in American literary history）
Oxford University Press, 2016, c2013
- : pbk
Available at / 3 libraries
-
No Libraries matched.
- Remove all filters.
Note
Originally published: 2013
Includes bibliographical references (p. [177]-212) and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
Writing the Rebellion presents a cultural history of loyalist writing in early America. There has been a spate of related works, but Philip Gould's narrative offers a completely different view of the loyalist/patriot contentions than appears in any of these accounts. By focusing on the literary projections of the loyalist cause, Gould dissolves the old legend that loyalists were more British than American, and patriots the embodiment of a new sensibility
drawn from their American situation and upbringing. He shows that both sides claimed to be heritors of British civil discourse, Old World learning, and the genius of English culture. The first half of Writing the Rebellion deals with the ways "political disputation spilled into arguments about style, form, and
aesthetics, as though these subjects could secure (or ruin) the very status of political authorship." Chapters in this section illustrate how loyalists attack patriot rhetoric by invoking British satires of an inflated Whig style by Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift. Another chapter turns to Loyalist critiques of Congressional language and especially the Continental Association, which was responsible for radical and increasingly violent measures against the Loyalists. The second half of Gould's
book looks at satiric adaptations of the ancient ballad tradition to see what happens when patriots and loyalists interpret and adapt the same text (or texts) for distinctive yet related purposes. The last two chapters look at the Loyalist response to Thomas Paine's Common Sense and the ways the
concept of the author became defined in early America. Throughout the manuscript, Gould acknowledges the purchase English literary culture continued to have in revolutionary America, even among revolutionaries.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: The Stamp Act Crisis and the Sublime Style of Politics
Chapter 2: Wit and Ridicule in Revolutionary New York
Chapter 3: Satirizing the Congress: Ancient Balladry and Literary Taste
Chapter 4: Loyalists and the Author of Common Sense
Chapter 5: New English Rebellion
Epilogue
by "Nielsen BookData"
