Cultural politics and American bohemians in pre-Civil War New York
Amid the social and political tensions plaguing the United States in the
years leading up to the Civil War, the North experienced a boom of
cultural activity. Young transient writers, artists, and musicians
settled in northern cities in pursuit of fame and fortune. Calling
themselves "bohemians" after the misidentified homeland of the Roma
immigrants to France, they established a coffeehouse society to share
their thoughts and creative visions. Popularized by the press, bohemians
became known for romantic, unorthodox notions of literature and the arts
that transformed nineteenth-century artistic culture.
Bohemian influence reached well beyond the arts, however. Building on
midcentury abolitionist, socialist, and free labor sentiments, bohemians
also flirted with political radicalism and social revolution. Advocating
free love, free men, and free labor, bohemian ideas had a profound
effect on the debate that raged among the splintered political factions
in the North, including the fledgling Republican Party from which
President Lincoln was ultimately elected in 1860.
Focusing on the overlapping nature of culture and politics, historian
Mark A. Lause delves into the world of antebellum bohemians and the
newspapermen who surrounded them, including Ada Clare, Henry Clapp, and
Charles Pfaff, and explores the origins and influence of bohemianism in
1850s New York. Against the backdrop of the looming Civil War, The
Antebellum Crisis and America's First Bohemians combines solid research
with engaging storytelling to offer readers new insights into the forces
that shaped events in the prewar years.
