Pacifist Prophet: Papunhank and the Quest for Peace in Early America by Richard W. Pointer (review)

Abstract

PaH_90_2_07_BookReviews.indd Page 332 21/04/23 6:01 PM PaH_90_2_07_BookReviews.indd Page 333 21/04/23 6:01 PM sharpening the political considerations of music in the young nation—what he calls “a musically driven political history” (5). This is part of a growing historiography from especially the past decade that tackles the intersection of these phenomena in the nineteenth century especially. This is not a book of musicology and there is no musical analysis (although there is a very interesting “book soundtrack” linked from the press webpage that recreates in a contemporary style some of the songs this book discusses). As such the writings about politics and music by elite men provide the bulk of the source material. The newspapers, private correspondences, reports of musical societies, and diaries reveal that Americans thought about music and politics in tandem. Early Americans thought about music in relation to politics and their ideas about the power of music shaped political experiences. Billy Coleman’s Harnessing Harmony reminds us that patriotic music is just as political as protest music, even if its political work is done to secure the power of the status quo.