Sixth Post

This week I decided to put the Norwegian literature behind and read more about the history of our nation. I started reading the book 1776 by David McCullough. The book is about America and it’s fight for freedom from England.

The beginning of the book was a window into England before the Revolutionary Started. McCullough wrote about the way the war was perceived in England and how the people treated the king. I found it very interesting that the king was treated as almost a god and crowds of around 60,000 people would gather to see him drive by in his enormous chariot. The book also gave a brief biography on the king himself. I found it different because he seemed like a very astute man. He was all tied up in himself and into fashions like other kings of the time. I had always known him to a crazy king who was unstable in his actions and made poor decisions. This is the way that I had read about him since I was young and this impression was cast by the School House Rock video about the Revolutionary War. The book mentioned that later in life he began to resemble a man much more like this due to a hereditary disease. I thought that this idea of the English perception of the war was very interesting because we never learned about it in school. We always learned what the Americans thought about what was going on and it was refreshing to hear what other people thought, especially what British people thought. I really like this book and look forward to reading more as the week goes by.