New Providence Memorial Library's Online Reading Group discussion

OK. Let's start with an easy one for this book. Considering that this collection of letters is very much a cultural portrait where B & deT discuss their observations and experiences for their relatives, what do they celebrate or criticize in the culture?? Examples could be family traditions, economic and political structures, the arts, language, food and religious beliefs.

This is a huge topic in this book so I expect to be adding to my comments as things strike me and I hope that you all do, too.

First up, deT is describing life in NYC and apparently not much has changed in America. He says that they are both "baffled by the sheer quantity of food that people somehow stuff down their gullets." Precursor to the obesity crisis?? It's also interesting how he describes a decent breakfast, good lunch around 3PM and then just tea at suppertime. They were doing the 8-hour diet before there was such a thing!

Since it's not until June that the boys get out of the city, they have a lot to say about American customs during their stay in NYC where they are invited about town. Imagine needing 1 pair of kid gloves / day ??

I must admit that they come off as a bit snooty. The main observation that they make about Americans is that they are more interested in the pursuit of wealth than anything else. Here is a sample from Beaumont:

"In the US political parties are almost unknown. The only thing that preoccupies everyone is commerce. It is the national passion and merchants conduct their business without benefit of armed national guards and troops of the line."

deT says:

"Here we are truly in another world. Political passions are only superficial. The one passion that runs deep, the only one that stirs the human heart day in and day out, is the acquisition of wealth, and there are a thousand ways of acquiring it without importuning the state.."


To his credit, tho, deT does make a perceptive observation about drawing comparisons between France & America. He says that doing so and trying to adapt ideas between the 2 countries is blindness. He talks about how the geography affects the institutions and that what works here would produce chaos in France and vice versa. That seems to make much sense. It is the French concept of "terroir" which they apply to their wines. The soil, the climate, the very local conditions of a place transform the taste of the wine so that the same variety of grape produces wines of vastly differing taste and quality depending on the location. And the same for government and society.

deT is quite taken w/ the landscape and the architecture of the Hudson Valley. Although he's not crazy about the inhabitants, he actually writes to his sister-in-law about modeling her country estate on some of the "inexpensive houses, whose form and disposition are extremely elegant and picturesque...there is nothing fresher and more graceful than these dwellings." He vows to get B involved in sketching some of the nicer houses so that Emilie can visualize them.

Nice b/c in the next paragraph, he bashes the social order for women and says that wives live like nuns, confined to the home and stuck with "admiring their husbands." I really can't imagine that ever took place here....

deT has come to a new low in criticizing Americans' intonation. He wonders if young ladies performing music are aiming to produce clashing and discordant sounds. He gets his back, tho. He calls the incident amusing but it sounded embarrassing. He was at somebody's house and she was singing a funny song. Everybody laughed at the end of the first verse. Him included since he took it for a substitution for laughing. Unfortunately, his mind wandered and at what he thought was the end of the song, he started laughing loudly but didn't realize until after that his mind had wandered so far that the lady had long-since finished the funny song and had actually just finished a very sad song. So, he got a lot of stares...

This is a very weird thing. Were Americans really much worse musicians than the French? Wherever they go, deT complains about the singing and piano playing. Was it just a different style?

I have no explanation about the music thing. Haven't found any indication about deT having perfect pitch which could account for some crankiness. Am reading a scathing description about religious practices, tho. Things have certainly changed here. Apparently, it used to be the law as well as strong public censuring that people attend services on Sunday and streets in front of churches were roped off.

deT tells a friend that sermons are about morals, not dogmas and there is nothing strong enough to cause anybody to get out a start a movement. He seems to feel that in France there is stronger religious feeling - pro or anti where as here ministers deal in moral commonplaces that apply across all sects and don't ruffle feathers.

He seems fascinated that all ministers in the prisons rotate services so that prisoners only get their sect periodically but still attend all other sects and nobody seems to mind.
In this age of relaxed blue laws, it's hard to imagine.

Yes, it's interesting that the USA was settled by those seeking freedom to practice religion. The first settlers wanted to be free to practice their own religion, but weren't tolerant of others' religions. It seems that by the 1830s there was much greater tolerance, on the east coast anyway. I wonder if part of that had to do with the distances people could travel. For example, my grandmother's family went to whatever protestant church was nearby, so she went to Methodist, Dutch Reformed and others.

I wonder if deT will come around to that more practical and reasonable explanation rather than his based on Amercans' "inert faith" and tolerance based on indifference.

And B follow up on the music thing...here he is in Boston where he admits there are many pretty women and fashion is the same as France but although "music is cultivated here somewhat more successfully than in NY; the great majority have no innate feeling for music." Oy!