Revolution Song

September 4, 2017
Shorto (Amsterdam: A History of the World’s Most Liberal City) brings the American Revolution to life in this vibrant account of six remarkable Revolutionary-era people, weaving together their stories to reflect on emergent understandings of individual freedom within the Atlantic world. Attuned to the cultural and political complexities of early America, Shorto examines well-known public figures—future president George Washington, Seneca warrior Cornplanter, and colonial administrator George Sackville—alongside those engaged in more private struggles for freedom: soldier’s daughter Margaret Moncrieffe; Venture Smith, an enslaved African man who later bought his freedom; and shoemaker Abraham Yates. Each character is portrayed as an individual, not an archetype. By paying close attention to the ways that particular lives unfold in the face of revolution, Shorto reflects on the emotional experience as well as the historical consequences of America’s violent birth. Readers interested in looking past America’s founding myths will be especially charmed by this history—George Washington, for one, appears in a new light as a devoted reader of self-help books with a penchant for fashion design. Though Shorto’s attempts to render the interior lives of his six characters can appear too speculative, his attention to everyday detail anchors his portraits and helps reveal the precariousness of freedom in an unequal, rapidly changing society.

September 15, 2017
Americans' struggle for freedom and independence affected a wide range of individuals.Aiming to reveal the reality of life in the Colonies and Britain before and during the Revolution, Shorto (Amsterdam: A History of the World's Most Liberal City, 2013, etc.) focuses on six different people: George Washington; British aristocrat and statesman George Germain, Lord Sackville; Venture Smith, an African-born slave; Abraham Yates, a shoemaker who rose to become mayor of his native Albany, New York; Cornplanter, a Seneca warrior; and Margaret Coghlan, the American-born daughter of a British officer. Except for Washington and Sackville, the protagonists are little known, which affords the author a fresh and often fascinating perspective on 18th-century life. Drawing on memoirs, letters, archival material, and much historical writing, he fashions a brisk chronological narrative that jumps from one individual to another. Smith's story is especially lively: a tall, strapping young man, he quickly learned "how to leverage his position" even though he was enslaved and managed to buy freedom for himself--and eventually for his wife and children. Settling in Stonington, Connecticut, he amassed considerable property, so much that when his former owner fell into bankruptcy, Smith offered him a mortgage on 100-plus acres of land, and, in the transaction, managed to provide an inheritance for his own son. Yates emerges as a complicated character: working for popular representation, nevertheless he was "convinced that government, any government, was a thing to be mistrusted," growing ever more powerful, "always at the expense of individuals." He was opposed to ratifying the Constitution because it gave the federal government "vast powers" and therefore was pleasantly surprised at the creation of the Bill of Rights, which ensured individual freedoms. Coghlan seems the most arbitrary--and unrepresentative--of Shorto's choices: young, intelligent, and well bred, she was beautiful enough to attract many indulgent lovers in America and abroad, where she ended her life in penury. If Coghlan "felt the pull of freedom," still Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Gloria Steinem hardly seem to be her "ideological descendants." An intimate look at life in tumultuous times.

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Starred review from October 15, 2017
In this timely and engaging group biography, Shorto (Amsterdam: A History of the World's Most Liberal City, 2013) explores the philosophical currents of the revolutionary era through an unusual assemblage of life stories. He juxtaposes George Washington and Seneca military leader and diplomat Cornplanter, and profiles Lord George Germain, architect of British policy and strategy during the Revolutionary War; Venture Smith, an African-born Connecticut slave who bought his freedom and established economic independence; New York anti-federalist politician and activist Abraham Yates Jr., and Margaret Moncrieffe Cochran, who fled an unwanted marriage to become a demimondaine, chronic debtor, and memoirist. Their experiences make for a compelling narrative, rich in unexpected twists, turns, and parallels, that allows Shorto to explore how engagement with revolutionary ideals reflected social and economic class, gender, region, race, culture, and political allegiance. The war itself is the fulcrum of the study but not its focus. Indeed, Shorto argues that the American Revolution never ended, because its promise of freedom has never been fully achieved, nor have its questions about the nature of the relations between individuals and society been fully answered. This important addition to popular literature on the revolution enables readers to engage these issues on many levels.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

October 15, 2017

Shorto (The Island at the Center of the World) depicts the American Revolution through the experiences of six individuals: Venture Smith, a slave who remade himself into a prosperous free man; George Germain, who directed Britain's war effort; Cornplanter, an Iroquois chief who fought alongside the British; Abraham Yates, who democratized New York politics; George Washington, who commanded the rebel army; and Margaret Coghlan, nee Moncrieffe, who defied gender norms. Caught up in war and intrigue, each of these figures provides insight into the era's tumultuous sociopolitical conditions. And their lives make for great stories. Germain was once court-martialed and nearly shot for refusing to obey orders. While leading a raid, Cornplanter happened to capture his own father, a white man. Coghlan was a British officer's daughter who irritated Washington, fell in love with future vice president Aaron Burr and flouted convention as a companion to sundry British lords and politicians. VERDICT A sprawling, engaging social and political history, Shorto's spin on the American Revolution never bores and often pleases. Public libraries should see high circulation.--Michael Rodriguez, Univ. of Connecticut

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 15, 2017

Author of the best-selling The Island at the Center of the World, Shorto tracks the emergence of America's particular concept of freedom by interweaving the stories of six people in Colonial America as the Revolution exploded. Battlefield figures include a Native American warrior, a British aristocrat, and George Washington himself, but Shorto also shows us a woman, a slave, and a laborer striving toward their own concept of freedom. All to show us how we continue to work out our understanding of freedom today.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.