The Americanization of Benjamin FranklinPenguin, 2004 - 299 páginas Central to America's idea of itself is the character of Benjamin Franklin. We all know him, or think we do: In recent works and in our inherited conventional wisdom, he remains fixed in place as a genial polymath and self-improver who was so very American that he is known by us all as the first American. The problem with this beloved notion of Franklin's quintessential Americanness, Gordon Wood shows us in this marvelous, revelatory book, is that it's simply not true. And it blinds us to the no less admirable or important but far more interesting man Franklin really was and leaves us powerless to make sense of the most crucial events of his life. Indeed, thinking of Franklin as the last American would be less of a hindrance to understanding many crucial aspects of his life--his preoccupation with becoming a gentleman; his longtime loyalty to the Crown and burning ambition to be a player in the British Empire's power structure; the personal character of his conversion to revolutionary; his reasons for writing the Autobiography; his controversies with John and Samuel Adams and with Congress; his love of Europe and conflicted sense of national identity; the fact that his death was greeted by mass mourning in France and widely ignored in America. But Franklin did become the Revolution's necessary man, Wood shows, second behind George Washington. Why was his importance so denigrated in his own lifetime and his image so distorted ever since? Ironically, Franklin's diplomacy in France, which was essential to American victory, was the cause of the suspicion that clouded his good name at home--and also the stage on which the "first American" persona made its debut. The consolidation of thismirage of Franklin would await the early nineteenth century, though, when the mask he created in his posthumously published Autobiography proved to be the model the citizens of a striving young democracy needed. The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin is a landmark work, a magnificent fresh vision of Franklin's life and reputation, filled with profound insights into the Revolution and into the emergence of America's idea of itself. |
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... Congress Cataloging - in - Publication Data Wood , Gordon S. The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin / Gordon S. Wood . p . cm . Includes bibliographical references ( p . ) and index . ISBN 1-59420-019 - X 1. Franklin , Benjamin , 1706 ...
... Congress Cataloging - in - Publication Data Wood , Gordon S. The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin / Gordon S. Wood . p . cm . Includes bibliographical references ( p . ) and index . ISBN 1-59420-019 - X 1. Franklin , Benjamin , 1706 ...
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Contenido
Becoming a British Imperialist | 61 |
CHAPTER 4 | 146 |
Becoming a Diplomat | 153 |
Becoming an American | 201 |
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affairs Albany Albany Congress American Revolution appointed aristocrats artisans assembly Autobiography Bailyn became become believed Benjamin Franklin Bernard Bailyn BF to William Boston Britain British Empire British government Collinson colonies colonists common Congress Crown Deborah Franklin Deborah Read early eighteenth century England English father France Franklin's Autobiography French friends Galloway gentleman gentry grandson Hillsborough House Hutchinson image of Franklin J. A. Leo Lemay James Jefferson John Adams Jonathan Shipley July king knew later legislature letters liberty living London Lopez and Herbert Lord Massachusetts ment minister nation negotiations never North Papers of Franklin Parliament patriots Penn Pennsylvania Philadelphia Philosophical political Poor Richard portrait printer printing Private Franklin Quaker Richard Bache Richard Henry Lee seemed Sept Society Stamp Act Thomas Thomas Hutchinson Thomas Penn thought tion tradesman University Press Vergennes Virginia virtue wanted Wealth William Franklin writing wrote York young