Advocate for America: the life of James Kirke Paulding

Abstract

Advocate for America is the first full-length biography of James Kirke Paulding (1778-1860), an American writer and public servant who for much of his long career stood in the first rank among native authors. Born in Westchester County, New York, Paulding was the lifelong friend of Washington Irving, the nation's first professional man of letters, and collaborated with him in early works including the celebrated Salamagundi series (1807-1808). In later decades he played a continuing role in the cultural life of the young nation, numbering among his friends and associates a great many other writers, editors, and publishers. In the present volume Aderman and Kime offer a multifaceted portrait of this intriguing figure, both individual and contextual. Drawing upon the author's family papers and extensive correspondence, they describe his family and social life while surveying the primary enterprise of his career, his work as a writer. Drawing additionally upon newspapers and magazines of the day and on the letters, documents, memoirs, and speeches of Paulding's associates, they establish a backdrop for viewing his personality and ideas as his contemporaries perceived them. This double focus brings into living perspective a loving husband and father, a versatile literary artist, an ardent nationalist, and a clear-eyed observer of the American scene