Wilson traces four major themes in the thought of Paine and Cobbett: the relationship between British radical ideas and American revolutionary ideology; the eighteenth-century revolution in rhetorical theory; the effect of the American and French Revolutions on British popular radicalism; and the American attempt to turn the United States into a new "empire of liberty". He challenges the view that Paine created a new literary style for a new audience of artisans and labourers, arguing instead that this style was part of a broader revolution in rhetoric, and discusses the interconnections between Paine's English and American careers. Wilson shows that the tension between the ideal and the real is central to understanding Cobbett. He analyzes Cobbett's American experiences, and examines the role of Paine's writings and the United States in Cobbett's subsequent career as a radical in England. The epilogue returns to the differences and similarities in Paine's and Cobbett's careers, examines their strategies for change, and discusses their ambiguous legacies to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

David A. Wilson is a professor in the Celtic Studies Program and the Department of History at the University of Toronto. He is the author and editor of several books including Ireland, a Bicycle, and a Tin Whistle and United Irishmen, United States: Immigrant Radicals in the Early Republic.

David A. Wilson's profile page

"a very well argued, very readable analysis of the thought and influence of two of the most articulate and important popular publicists of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Anglo-American world." Alfred Young, Department of History, University of Northern Illinois "a tightly-knit, evocative book...presents a new and compelling interpretation of eighteenth century Anglo-American radicalism and its nineteenth century survivals...opens a whole new view of Paine and brings Cobbett into the mainstream of intellectual and cultural history for the first time." Robert M. Calhoon, Department of History, University of North Carolina