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A review by kevin_shepherd
Thomas Paine: His Life, His Time and the Birth of the Modern Nations by Craig Nelson, Craig Nelson
4.0
“How could the American people ignore this hero who had convinced their ancestors to renounce the depraved government of their home land and build a new world? This author who had conceived and written the very principles on which their nation was founded? This theorist whose writings were the very essence of what it meant to be an American? This man who had fought so publicly for decades over the United States’ very right to exist as something beyond an abused and belittled colony?”
One could make a fairly convincing argument that it is Thomas Paine, not George Washington, who deserves the moniker “Father of Our Country.” If Washington was the engineer of American independence then it was Thomas Paine who was its architect.
Thanks in no small part to Christopher Hitchens, I have read at least five books written by or about Mr. Paine. He, like Orwell and Nietzsche and Plath, has become something of an obsession of mine. I find him intensely interesting and quizzically paradoxical. By far his most dangerous commodities were his thoughts; they brought him, on almost every publication, to the brink of either the gallows or the guillotine. His ideas landed him in prison for fear that they would topple empires and incite revolutions (they arguably did both). His progressive notions are the reason he is still revered in some circles and reviled in others.
“The name is enough. Every person has ideas of him. Some respect his genius and dread the man, some reverence his political while they hate his religious opinions. Some love the man but not his private manners. Indeed, he has done nothing which has not extremes in it. He never appears but we love and hate him. He is as great a paradox as ever appeared in human nature.” -Anonymous Paine Contemporary
Thomas Paine believed that a republic had to be populated by educated and selfless citizens, otherwise it would fall into the hands of a “craven mob.” Has any idea in American history ever been more prophetic? His circle of supporters included the likes of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin, while his long list of enemies, which included John Adams* and his son John Quincy Adams, was just as formidable.
"I detest that book and its tendencies from the bottom of my heart.” -John Adams on The Rights of Man
*NOTE: to be fair, John Adams, especially later in his life, rarely had a good word to say about anyone.
“It is said he was always a peevish intimate, but Thomas Paine was one of the most instructive men I have ever known. He had a surprising memory and a brilliant fancy. His mind was a storehouse of facts and useful observations. He was full of lively anecdotes and ingenious, original, pertinent remarks upon almost every subject.” -Joel Barlow
Craig Nelson’s biography on Thomas Paine is well written and should be of interest to all history buffs regardless of their political or theological leanings. I thought I already knew a lot about the man and still I learned a great deal. Highly recommended.
"In a time when both rights and reason are under several kinds of open and covert attack, the life and writing of Thomas Paine will always be part of the arsenal on which we shall need to depend." -Christopher Hitchens, 2007
One could make a fairly convincing argument that it is Thomas Paine, not George Washington, who deserves the moniker “Father of Our Country.” If Washington was the engineer of American independence then it was Thomas Paine who was its architect.
Thanks in no small part to Christopher Hitchens, I have read at least five books written by or about Mr. Paine. He, like Orwell and Nietzsche and Plath, has become something of an obsession of mine. I find him intensely interesting and quizzically paradoxical. By far his most dangerous commodities were his thoughts; they brought him, on almost every publication, to the brink of either the gallows or the guillotine. His ideas landed him in prison for fear that they would topple empires and incite revolutions (they arguably did both). His progressive notions are the reason he is still revered in some circles and reviled in others.
“The name is enough. Every person has ideas of him. Some respect his genius and dread the man, some reverence his political while they hate his religious opinions. Some love the man but not his private manners. Indeed, he has done nothing which has not extremes in it. He never appears but we love and hate him. He is as great a paradox as ever appeared in human nature.” -Anonymous Paine Contemporary
Thomas Paine believed that a republic had to be populated by educated and selfless citizens, otherwise it would fall into the hands of a “craven mob.” Has any idea in American history ever been more prophetic? His circle of supporters included the likes of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin, while his long list of enemies, which included John Adams* and his son John Quincy Adams, was just as formidable.
"I detest that book and its tendencies from the bottom of my heart.” -John Adams on The Rights of Man
*NOTE: to be fair, John Adams, especially later in his life, rarely had a good word to say about anyone.
“It is said he was always a peevish intimate, but Thomas Paine was one of the most instructive men I have ever known. He had a surprising memory and a brilliant fancy. His mind was a storehouse of facts and useful observations. He was full of lively anecdotes and ingenious, original, pertinent remarks upon almost every subject.” -Joel Barlow
Craig Nelson’s biography on Thomas Paine is well written and should be of interest to all history buffs regardless of their political or theological leanings. I thought I already knew a lot about the man and still I learned a great deal. Highly recommended.
"In a time when both rights and reason are under several kinds of open and covert attack, the life and writing of Thomas Paine will always be part of the arsenal on which we shall need to depend." -Christopher Hitchens, 2007