Death of a Notary: Conquest and Change in Colonial New York by Donna Merwick
He was the only one. He was the only man to have committed suicide in the town's seventeenth-century history. So begins Donna Merwick's fascinating tale of a Dutch notary who ended his life in his adopted community of Albany. In a major feat of historical reconstruction, she introduces us to Adriaen Janse van Ilpendam and the long-forgotten world he inhabited in Holland's North American colony. Her powerful narrative will make readers care for this quiet and studious man, an ordinary settler for whom the clash of empires brought tragedy. Like so many of his fellow countrymen, Janse left his Dutch homeland as a young adult to try his luck in New Netherland. After spending a few years on Manhattan Island, he moved on to the fur trading settlement today known as Albany. Merwick traces his journey to a new continent and re-creates the satisfying existence this respected burgher enjoyed with his wife in the bustling town. As a notary Janse was, in the author's words, surrounded by stories, those he listened to and recorded, the hundreds he archived in a chest or trunk. His familiar life was turned upside down by the British conquest of the colony. Merwick recounts the changes brought about by the new rulers and imagines the despair Janse must have felt when English, a language he had never learned, replaced his native tongue in official transactions. In any military adventure, truth is alleged to be the first casualty. Merwick offers a poignant reminder that the first casualties are in fact people. As much a musing on what history obscures as what it reveals, her book is a superior work by a master practitioner of her craft. Editorial Reviews Review A thoughtful examination of the roles played by writers and researchers, ruminating on the pawns that such average citizens can become both of history and of historians. ? Library Journal Academic Newsletter A gem of a book.... The author describes Janse's notarial career as a matter of 'nearsighted work. And the metaphor applies to her own efforts as well... as Death of a Notary is a strikingly successful example of... microhistory. Merwick is, at the same time, an expert storyteller, one who can piece together her admittedly fragmentary evidence in compelling, sometimes surprising ways. -- John Demos ? Washington Times Merwick presents a complex and fascinating account of van Ilpendam's career and daily life in late 17th-century Albany.... A major work of scholarship. ? AB Bookman's Weekly Ms. Merwick's careful, moving reconstruction of Janse's life and death shows what happens when a person who lives by words finds those he knows no longer suffice. ? The Chronicle of Higher Education Not only will specialists find the book useful in the debate over Dutch-English influence in New York, but it is a good beginning for the general reader seeking to understand the state. Above all, however, Death of a Notary is a rare commodity for a history book?a good story told well. -- Don Roper ? History This outstanding contribution to Colonial social history is highly recommended for all undergraduate and graduate history collections. ? Choice Review This is a beautiful book. Donna Merwick has written an intimate history of a sort of man few American historians have encountered, since almost none of us reads Dutch or has bothered to care about the Dutch in the New World. But mainly this is the work of an artist-historian, lovingly crafted to bring an obscure person (and profession) to life. What a triumph of historical sensibility! -- Stanley N. Katz, Princeton University About the Author Donna Merwick is Visiting Fellow at the Center for Cross-Cultural Research, Australian National University. Her most recent book is Possessing Albany, 1630-1710: The Dutch and English Experiences.
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Binding: Hardcover
Published by: Cornell University Press: , 1999
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ISBN: 9780801436086 | 0801436087
304 pages.
Book Condition: Very Good
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