Description
Book SynopsisThe age of revolution, in which kings were dethroned, radical ideals of human equality embraced, and new constitutions written, was also the age of prophecy. Neither an archaic remnant nor a novel practice, prophecy in the eighteenth century was rooted both in the primitive worldview of the Old Testament and in the vibrant intellectual environment of the philosophers and their political allies, the republicans. In Doomsayers: Anglo-American Prophecy in the Age of Revolution, Susan Juster examines the culture of prophecy in Great Britain and the United States from 1765 to 1815 side by side with the intellectual and political transformations that gave the period its historical distinction as the era of enlightened rationalism and democratic revolution.
Although sometimes viewed as madmen or fools, prophets of the 1790s and early 1800s were very much products of a liberal commercial society, even while they registered their disapproval of the values and practices of that so
Trade Review
"This delightful and provocative book describes a dimension of Anglo-American culture typically lost from view." * Journal of the Early Republic *
"This original, richly textured book . . . skillfully challenges comfortable notions about the historical interplay between faith and reason." * William and Mary Quarterly *
"Juster's finely grained description overturns assumptions that secular culture displaced supernaturalism without a struggle. . . . Highly recommended." * Choice *
"Outstanding." * Journal of Church and State *
"With dazzling execution, Susan Juster not only gives us a fascinating cast of human characters but brings alive the Anglo-American ferment in the Age of Revolution over religious change, theories of what connects body to mind and soul, modes of self-presentation and communication, and critiques of modernity. This elegant study contains many wonderful surprises." * Cornelia H. Dayton, University of Connecticut *
"In the retrieval of early American religion, Susan Juster is not just the smartest, most imaginative scholar of her generation. She is also the most artful and the edgiest. Her luminous, atmospheric study of prophecy in the early republic will change forever the way you think about the democratization of American culture. And her doomsayers themselves, rendered brilliantly in the tangles of authenticity and imposture that define democracy, will steal your heart even as they unsettle you." * Michael Zuckerman, University of Pennsylvania *
