The strange genius of Mr. O : the world of the United States' first forgotten celebrity / Carolyn Eastman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Eastman, Carolyn, author.

Contributor:

Omohundro Institute of Early American History & Culture, publisher.

Series:

Published by the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture and the University of North Carolina Press

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Oratory--History--United States--19th century.

Oratory.

Orators--United States--Biography.

Orators.

Ogilvie, James, 1760-1820.

Ogilvie, James.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (1 online resource x, 348 pages.)

Place of Publication:

Williamsburg, Virginia ; Chapel Hill, North Carolina : University of North Carolina Press, [2021]

Summary:

"The Strange Genius of Mr. O is at once the biography of a remarkably odd celebrity--a gaunt, opium-addicted Scottish orator who lectured in a toga--and a tour of the fledgling United States. James Ogilvie arrived in the United States in 1793 as an educated, impoverished, and deeply ambitious teacher. By the time he returned to Britain in 1819, he was a celebrity known simply as "Mr. O" who counted the nation's leading politicians, writers, and intellectuals among his admirers. Following Ogilvie on lecture tours from the Atlantic coast as far west as frontier Kentucky, Eastman reconstructs his path to renown, explaining how and why Ogilvie mattered to the citizens of the early republic. His example inspired countless men and more than a few women to become amateur orators and helped inaugurate America's golden age of oratory. At a time when Americans were eager for national unity, Ogilvie and his audiences hoped that eloquence might knit a divided public together--that educated, elevated oratory might provide a bedrock for citizenship and civic belonging. In Eastman's hands, Ogilvie's remarkable life story has as much to tell us about a fascinating man as it has to reveal about the nation he helped fashion"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

7. A Cosmopolitan Celebrity in a Provincial Republic

8. Forging Celebrity and Manliness in a Toga, 1810-1815

9. Fighting Indians in a Masculine Kentucky Landscape, 1811-1813

10. A Golden Age of American Eloquence, 1814-1817

11. A Fall from Grace

or, Oratory versus Print, 1815-1817

12. "A Very Extraordinary Orator" in Britain, 1817-1820

13. The Meanings of Melancholy, 1780-1820

Epilogue. Celebrating and Forgetting

Acknowledgments

Notes

Index

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

Y

Cover

Half Title

Title

Copyright

Dedication

Contents

List of Illustrations

Introduction. A Celebrity in the Early Republic

1. The Ogilviad

or, Two Students at King's College Fight a Duel in Poetry, 1786-1793

2. "Restless and Ardent and Poetical": An Ambitious Scottish Schoolteacher in Virginia, 1793-1803

3. Ogilvie and Opium, a Love Story, 1803-1809

4. A "Romantic Excursion" to Deliver Oratory, 1808

5. Navigating the Shoals of Belief and Skepticism, October-November 1808

6. How to Hate Mr. O, 1809-1814

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes index.

ISBN:

979-88-908589-4-8

979-88-908589-5-5

1-4696-6051-2

OCLC:

1227392586