This new edition of the early Dickens classic (1842) returns to the
stores the first of his two long out-of-print travel books, the
other being Pictures From Italy (1846). The editorial improvements
are not great but do embody Dickens' own revisions (and restore his
excisions). Written at 30, between Barnaby Rudge and The Life and
Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, and based largely on letters home
describing his American experiences, American Notes is not the
vitriolic work many Americans first thought it was because of
Dickens' opposition to slavery, his surprise at our more graceless
habits and description of the widespread practice of spitting, of
corruption in the House of Representatives, of the torture and
agony of prolonged incarceration in Philadelphia's solitary prison
and in Manhattan's stygian Tombs prison, and of the large sows and
swine population trotting along Broadway "and mingling with the
best society, on an equal, if not superior footing. . . They are
the city scavengers, these pigs. Ugly brutes they are; having. .
.scanty, brown backs, like the lids of old horsehair trunks:
spotted with unwholesome black blotches. . . They are never
attended upon, or fed, or driven, or caught, but are thrown upon
their own resources in early life, and become preternaturally
knowing in consequence. . . At this hour, just as evening is
closing in, you will see them roaming towards bed by scores, eating
their way to the last." Dickens was also stony towards the American
habit of pirating the works of English authors - he knew American
Notes would be pirated massively, and called (quite unpopularly)
for international copyright laws. And his comments on slavery, and
the horrible advertisements identifying runaway slaves, which he
reprints, verge on the gruesome and would madden any pro-slaver. He
is more kinky about Boston, Hartford, New Haven, Pittsburgh,
Cincinnati, about life on the Prairie, the physical beauties of
travel by steamboat, and is stunned and rhapsodical about Niagara
Falls. In a postscript added in 1868, after a return trip, he
comments that he has "been received with unsurpassable politeness,
delicacy, sweet temper, hospitality, consideration, and with
unsurpassable respect for the privacy daily enforced upon me by the
nature of my avocation here, and the state of my health." It was
the least we could do for such an invaluable and honest picture of
ourselves. (Kirkus Reviews)
'I have made up my mind (with God's leave) to go to America - and to start as soon after Christmas as it will be safe'
So wrote an exuberant Dickens shortly before his voyage to America in 1842. He was the most famous of many travellers of his time who journeyed to the New World, curious to find out about the revolutionary new civilization which had captured the English imagination. His frank, often humorous descriptions cover everything from his comically uncomfortable sea voyage to his wonder at the Niagara Falls. In general Dickens is critical of what he saw as a society ruled by money and built on slavery, with unsavoury manners and a corrupt press. His unfavourable account provoked a hostile response in America and Britain, although he was to change his opinion later.
American Notes can be read as a journey in the long-established tradition of Chaucer, Bunyan or Swift - as a progress to knowledge through varied experiences. Above all, it is a fascinating account of what was for Dickens an illuminating encounter with the New World.
This edition includes a critical introduction, chronology, explanatory notes and three appendices reflecting Dickens's changing views on America.
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