Letters from America

Letters from America vividly conveys the experiences of a journey through America that resulted in Tocqueville's classic Democracy in America (1835). The correspondence actually has a coauthor. Tocqueville's traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, composed nearly one-third of the letters in this collection and became the principal author of their joint study of American prisons (On the Penitentiary System in the United States ..., 1833). Writing to their families and intimate friends, both travelers included many observations of special interest to their correspondents, especially Catholics and French-speaking inhabitants in North America. The letters offer readers a cascade of first impressions and enduring European perspectives and prejudices. They incessantly juggled ideas that might synthesize American society into a coherent and logical system. Toward the journey's end, Tocqueville's correspondence reveals an understanding about how much more he needed to learn about both France and America in order to complete his investigation. No better evidence is needed to dissipate the oft-repeated assertion that the journey merely confirmed perspectives embedded in Tocqueville's thought long before he began his transatlantic adventure. Readers should be mindful of a similar recent publication, Alexis de Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont in America, edited by Olivier Zung (CH, Jun'11, 48-5889). Summing Up: Recommended. All levels/libraries. S. Drescher University of Pittsburgh

Lately a historian of the first decades of the Third Republic (For the Soul of France, 2009), Brown here translates Tocqueville. A 2007 biography (Alexis de Tocqueville, by Hugh Brogan) and a 2010 narrative of his famous 1831-32 journey through the U.S. (Tocqueville's Discovery of America, by Leo Damrosch) evidence the enduring contemporary curiosity about the French traveler. The latter title tapped the source of Brown's present work, letters Tocqueville and his traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, mailed back to France. Even 180 years later, they are eminently readable as their authors' initial impressions of Americans and of American landscapes, as missives to entertain or commiserate with their recipients, and, in Tocqueville's case, as Brown notes, as a reflection of his fretting about French politics. Tocqueville was connected to the Bourbon dynasty overthrown in 1830, and his trip was, in effect, a temporary self-exile. If the letters exude homesickness, their bounty of acute aperçus of America's social and political conditions, for which Tocqueville became famous, should ensure interest wherever the above titles or Toqueville's classic Democracy in America circulate.--Taylor, Gilbert Copyright 2010 Booklist

Readers who enjoyed Peter Carey's novel Parrot & Olivier in America, which riffs on Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont's visit to America in 1831, should be delighted by this collection. For here is the real thing: the first English-language translation of all of Tocqueville's letters from that visit, supplemented by the correspondence of his friend and traveling partner Beaumont. Although the companions originally traveled to America to study penal reform, they commented freely on everything they experienced. Many ideas eventually appearing in Tocqueville's two-volume Democracy in America (1835; 1840) first surfaced in these letters: the American infatuation with commerce, a seemingly infinite frontier and cheap land for everyone, the absence of primogeniture, weak central government, the anomalous standing of religion. The young men noticed American women, too, though not always admiringly. Slavery appalled them, as did the ruthless treatment of indigenous tribes. VERDICT It's no surprise that the letters are jam-packed with insightful observations. What is surprising is how alive they are even today. This is living history, not embalmed. A collection that combines both charm and historical relevance, it should appeal widely.-David Keymer, Modesto, CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.