Imagined Empires
Incas, Aztecs, and the New World of American Literature, 1771–1876

A 1999 study of the influence of South American culture on early American culture, in particular literature.

Eric Wertheimer (Author)

9780521622295, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 November 1998

256 pages, 3 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.55 kg

"Recommended for graduate and research collections." Choice

Imagined Empires, first published in 1999, demonstrates that early American culture, and in particular literature, took great interest in South American civilisations, especially the Incas and Aztecs, and in so doing made a statement about the role of the United States as an empire in the emerging political order of New World colonies and states. By examining the work of Philip Freneau, Joel Barlow, William Prescott, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman, the long-contested concept of 'indigenous origins' is given expanded meaning beyond traditional critiques of American culture. Eric Wertheimer recovers the Incas and Aztecs in Anglo-American literature, and thus sheds new light on national sovereignty, identity and the development of an American history narrative.

Introduction: ancient America in the postcolonial national imaginary
1. Commencements: pre-Columbian worlds and Philip Freneau's literature of American empire
2. Diplomacy: Joel Barlow's scripting and subscripting of ancient America
3. Noctography: Prescott's sketchings of Aztecs and Incas
4. Mutations: Melville, representation, and South American history
5. Passage: two rivulets and the obscurity of American maps.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: fiction, novelists & prose writers [DSK]