Tuesday, June 2, 2015

Compare and contrast Abigail Adams' letter to her daughter with Jean de Crevecoeur's essay from "Letters from an American Farmer."

In his Letters from an American
Farmer
, Michel Guillaume-Jean de Crevecoeur has nothing but praise for
American and the beauty of the wilderness.  Of the colonies, he
writes,



Here
he [who comes to America] beholds fair cities, substantial villages, extensive fields,
an immense country filled with decent houses, good roads, orchards, meadows, and
bridges..."



Regarding the
uncharted lands, Crevecoeur has nothing but praise in his romantic idealization of the
wilderness.  For instance, he writes of how the effete vegetation of Europe finds new
life in America, and he states that there is an abundance of timber and other natural
resources.  To Crevecoeur, it is a larger and fuller life that the American can live.  A
likely comparison to Thoreau is made with Crevecoeur who lives for years in the
wilderness, ecstatic over its beauty.  He praises the idyllic life that can be lived in
the new country of America.


While Abigail Adams's letter to
her daughter shortly after she has arrived at the new White House in Washington, D.C.,
praises the scenic Potomac River and the countryside's beauty, it is clear that she is
rather disappointed in the rustic state of the area and the White House itself. The
place is not finished, the roads are impassable when wet, people are three or four miles
away.  Her greatest complaint is that there are no bells to summon servants in such a
large house, and no wood can be procured to warm the house.  There is coal available,
but no grates:


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but such a place as Georgetown appears,--why our
Milton is beautiful. But no comparisons;--if they will put me up some bells, and let me
have wood enough to keep fires, I design to be pleased. I could content myself almost
anywhere three months; but surrounded with forest, can you believe that wood is not to
be had, because people cannot be found to cut and cart it?....{Breisler] has had
recourse to coals; but we cannot get grates made and set. We have indeed come into a new
country.



Clearly, Abigail
Adams's assessment of her new location is less than idyllic, but Crevcoeur finds nothing
wrong with any aspect of America.

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