Representative Americans

Like the preceeding books in The Representative Americans series, The Romantics makes history human by putting tissue on the skeletal framework of names and dates. Risjord uses a biographical approach to make the past more concrete and vivid, to recover a heritage that todayOs reader can feel and experience. The Romantics treats people whose principal contributions fell in the first half of the nineteenth century, though several of those studied lived into the Civil War era and beyond. While certain individuals may be unfamiliar to readers_the slaves Prince and Fed, Free Frank, a black farmer of Kentucky and Illinois, and the OLowell Girls, O Lucy Lacom and Sarah Bagley_the majority of the figures studied in The Romantics are well known. Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams carry the political story at the beginning of the era; John C. Fremont bears that burden at the end of the time period. The heart of the volume introduces some of the leading literary and cultural figures of the age_Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne_as well as some of the voices of reform_Horace Mann, Frances Wright, Catharine Beecher, and Theodore and Angelina Grimke Weld. Tying it all together is the prevailing spirit of American Romanticism

Norman K. Risjord is emeritus professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he taught for over three decades. He is the author of Chesapeake Politics, 1781-1800 and Jefferson's America, 1760-1815. He is general editor of the American Profiles series for Madison House.

Part 1 Preface Part 2 Introduction: American Romanticism Part 3 The Political Theater: Andrew Jackson versus John Quincy Adams Chapter 4 The Soldier and the Diplomat: Fortuitous Allies Chapter 5 Contrasting Styles of Presidency Chapter 6 Old Man Eloquent Part 7 Literary Romantics Chapter 8 Palph Waldo Emerson, Philosopher-Poet Chapter 9 Margaret Fuller: The Romantic as Feminist Chapter 10 Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Romance and the Reality of Domesticity Part 11 Impulse to Reform Chapter 12 Horace Mann: "In a republic, ignorance is a crime" Chapter 13 Frances Wright: The Cost of Social Change Chapter 14 Catharine Beecher: The Limits of Reform Chapter 15 Theodore and Angelina Grimke Weld: The Antislavery Dilemma Part 16 (Un)Common Lives Chapter 17 Prince and Fed: Varieties of Slave Experience Chapter 18 Lucy Larcom and Sarah Bagley, Lowell Girls Chapter 19 Free Frank, Subtle Entrepreneur Part 20 Of Men and Nature Chapter 21 Osceola: The Tragedy of Indian Removal Chapter 22 Jedediah Strong Smith, Mountain Man Chapter 23 John C. Fremont, Destiny's Agent Part 24 Index