Pulitzer Prize History Winner
The Flowering of New England, 1815–1865
by Van Wyck Brooks
Summary
Brooks portrays the literary and intellectual awakening of New England in the decades before the Civil War, following figures such as Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, and Longfellow. Rather than dry analysis, he writes an evocative cultural narrative that brings the region's writers and ideas to life. The book celebrates a creative golden age and helped fix the period in the popular understanding of American letters.
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Historical Context & Significance
This was the first book in Brooks's Makers and Finders series, and it won both the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1937 and a National Book Award.