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Joel Barlow

American Citizen in a Revolutionary World

Richard Buel Jr.

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Poet, republican, diplomat, and entrepreneur, Joel Barlow filled many roles and registered impressive accomplishments. In the first biography of this fascinating figure in decades, Richard Buel Jr. recounts the life of a man more intimately connected to the Age of Revolution than perhaps any other American.

Barlow was a citizen of the revolutionary world, and his adventures throughout the United States and Europe during both the American and French Revolutions are numerous and notorious. From writing his epic poem, The Vision of Columbus, to plotting a republican revolution in Britain to...

Poet, republican, diplomat, and entrepreneur, Joel Barlow filled many roles and registered impressive accomplishments. In the first biography of this fascinating figure in decades, Richard Buel Jr. recounts the life of a man more intimately connected to the Age of Revolution than perhaps any other American.

Barlow was a citizen of the revolutionary world, and his adventures throughout the United States and Europe during both the American and French Revolutions are numerous and notorious. From writing his epic poem, The Vision of Columbus, to plotting a republican revolution in Britain to negotiating the release of American sailors taken captive by Barbary pirates, Joel Barlow personified the true spirit of the tumultuous times in which he lived.

No one witnessed more climactic events or interacted with more significant people than Joel Barlow. It was his unique vision, his unfailing belief in republicanism, and his entrepreneurial spirit that drove Barlow to pursue the revolutionary ideal in a way more emblematic of the age than the lives of many of its prominent heroes.

Buel is a knowledgeable guide, and in telling Barlow’s story he explores the cultural landscape of the early American republic and engages the broader themes of the Age of Revolution. Few books explore in such a comprehensive fashion the political, economic, ideological, diplomatic, and technological dimensions of this defining moment in world history.

Reviews

Reviews

Buel's Joel Barlow is the first biography in two generations, and the best. No earlier biographer has given nearly as detailed and rich a portrait of Barlow's perhaps singularly expansive role in the cultural life, commerce, politics, and intrigue of the age of revolution.

Thoroughly researched and well writen, Buel's work is a refreshing addition to the scholarship on the defining era of the US. A must for any historian of the early republic, Joel Barlow conveys the American spirit of persevering through difficult times while remaining truly a humanitarian. Essential.

Buel's work... is admirable in scope.

The luminous strengths of this biography are the new facts and sources that Buel elucidates as well as their contextualization within the historical period that Barlow lived.

Barlow deserves fresh biographical treatment, and no one is better qualified than Buel to do the job. His book will certainly take its place among the most important and authoritative biographies on the Founders.

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Book Details

Publication Date
Status
Available
Trim Size
6
x
9
Pages
448
ISBN
9780801897696
Illustration Description
6 halftones
Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Introduction
1. Beginnings
2. Ambitious Goals
3. Uncharted Waters
4. Dead Ends
5. Literary Recognition
6. Land Fever
7. Disgrace
8. Revolutionary Adventurer
9. The Terror
10. Commercial

List of Illustrations
Introduction
1. Beginnings
2. Ambitious Goals
3. Uncharted Waters
4. Dead Ends
5. Literary Recognition
6. Land Fever
7. Disgrace
8. Revolutionary Adventurer
9. The Terror
10. Commercial Interlude
11. Mission to Algiers
12. Franco-American Crisis
13. Republican Prophet
14. Responding to France's Apostasy
15. Mixed Reception
16. Washington Insider
17. Europe Redux
18. Finale
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Notes
Essay on Sources
Index

Author Bio
Featured Contributor

Richard Buel Jr., Ph.D.

Richard Buel Jr. is emeritus professor of history at Wesleyan University and author of America on the Brink: How the Political Struggle over the War of 1812 almost Destroyed the Young Republic and In Irons: Britain’s Naval Supremacy and the American Revolutionary Economy.
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