New England's Crises and Cultural Memory

John McWilliams' book is an ambitious attempt to combine New England history and literature from the Puritans through the Revolutionary period to the antebellum era. In this magisterial study, McWilliams shows how successive narratives of crises,real or imagined, reflected historical realities while proving adaptable to later settlers. He offers an all-encompassing narrative of one crucial region in the American literary and historical experience. Audacious in scope and intellectual...
More Description

John McWilliams' book is an ambitious attempt to combine New England history and literature from the Puritans through the Revolutionary period to the antebellum era. In this magisterial study, McWilliams shows how successive narratives of crises,real or imagined, reflected historical realities while proving adaptable to later settlers. He offers an all-encompassing narrative of one crucial region in the American literary and historical experience. Audacious in scope and intellectual range, McWilliams brings to light new historical contexts for understanding crucial events in early American literature and history.