American Colonies, by Alan Taylor

This book, the first volume in a series called the Penguin history of the United States, in which noted historian Eric Foner (noted for his writings on slavery and Reconstruction in particular) serves as the series editor, does not have an enviable position. There are a host of complications in writing about colonial history, including the complications of imperial histories, the length of time involved, as well as the delicacy of questions involving native (and colonial) demography, the role of slavery and other working arrangements like indentured servitude, and the complexity of identity politics. The author, I believe, chooses the best approach possible for dealing with the multifarious issues of dealing with the period–he covers a wide span and thus increases the depth and contents of this book to provide a suitable comparative history that compares not only across time and space but also manages to integrate regional history as well as continental and Atlantic history approaches. The result is a compelling read that offers something for everyone who wants to know about colonial history, and if you want to read more about the period, without having to read a multi-volume work, this book offers content that is both succinct but also very detailed and complete, which offers a best of both worlds approach.

The author is aided in his elegant combination of succinct writing as well as immense detail by his ability to talk about more and thus be able to draw the appropriate comparisons and contrasts that help make this history deeply worthwhile. It is far better to gain insights about the usual familiar suspects in colonial America if you add the context of the 14th colony in Nova Scota, the West Indies, French, Spanish, Dutch, and even Russian America, the perspective of various tribes, as well as the perspectives of women, indentured servants, and frustrated colonial and imperial authorities. The author, in the course of his complicated work, makes a lot of very intriguing conclusions that he draws from the available evidence, including the force multiplier of native support to French power in being able to hold on against the far more numerous but far less diplomatically adroit English-speaking colonies, and also the vital insight that the paradise of freedom for European whites in the English speaking colonies was not an unmixed blessing for the unfree, or for those who stood in the way of the need for more land to stave off social discontent within the colonies. The author, given his familiarity and fondness for such ironies, is well-equipped to deal with the strength of British (and later American) power on the North American continent through trade and demographics overcoming limitations in diplomacy, as well as the fact that it was the removal of the common foe of French Canada and the resulting desire of imperial England to reduce the freedom of the mainland American colonies that provoked the crisis of independence that set American history on a separate (though related) track from the previous English one that had taken place before.

Although colonial history in America is a minefield when it comes to identity politics, the author manages to successfully deal with this issue by discussing identity in rather pointed ways. He shows the way that different colonial efforts were helped or harmed by questions of identity, in that the French refusal to let its religious minorities leave the country to settle its colonies meant that these restive Protestants ended up supporting English colonial efforts instead. He demonstrates that eventually the diverse populations of the English colonies were able to develop cohesion by forming a common identity against others–including blacks and natives–which would have long consequences far beyond the scope of this book. After about 500 pages of material that begins with the settlement of America by the indigenous peoples and ending with a look towards the growth of the United States in the middle 19th century all the way to the Pacific, even including a bit of Hawaiian history as well. With thematic chapters carefully organized as to the region and time period they discuss, or the theme and time period involved, this book is one that any serious student of the colonial period will want to read at some point.