Common Sense and Other Writings

by Thomas Paine

Book Overview

&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LI&&RCommon Sense and Other Writings&&L/I&&R, by &&LB&&RThomas Paine&&L/B&&R, is part of the &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R&&LI&&R &&L/I&&Rseries, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R: &&LDIV&&RNew introductions commissioned from todays top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the readers viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriateAll editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics &&L/I&&Rpulls together a constellation of influences--biographical, historical, and literary--to enrich each readers understanding of these enduring works.&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&R &&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&RThough he did not emigrate from England to the American colonies until 1774, just a few months before the Revolutionary War began, &&LB&&RThomas Paine&&L/B&&R had an enormous impact on that war and the new nation that emerged from it. &&LI&&RCommon Sense&&L/I&&R, the instantly popular pamphlet he published in January 1776, argued that the goal of the struggle against the British should be not simply tax reform, as many were calling for, but complete independence. His rousing, radical voice was balanced by the equally independence-minded but more measured tones of Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration of Independence later that year.&&LBR&&R&&LBR&&RIn later works, such as &&LI&&RThe Rights of Man&&L/I&&R, &&LI&&RThe Age of Reason&&L/I&&R, and other selections included in this volume, Paine proved himself a visionary moralist centuries ahead of his time. He believed that every human has the natural right to life's necessities and that government's role should be to provide for those in dire need. An impassioned opponent of all forms of slavery, he understood that no one in poverty is truly free, a lesson still to be learned by many of our leaders today.&&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&R &&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LB&&RJoyce Appleby&&L/B&&R, Professor Emerita at the University of California, Los Angeles, has followed the trajectory of American nation-building in her books &&LI&&RCapitalism and a New Social Order: The Republican Vision of the 1790s&&L/I&&R, &&LI&&RInheriting the Revolution: The First Generation of Americans&&L/I&&R, &&LI&&RThomas Jefferson&&L/I&&R, and &&LI&&RA Restless Past: History and the American Public&&L/I&&R. &&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1593082096
• ISBN13: 9781593082093
• Release Date: September 2005
• Publisher: Barnes & Noble Classics
• Length: 432 Pages
• Weight: 0.84 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 5.4" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

essential for research

Although this edition of Paine's works dates from 1993 it is worth buying simply for the introduction by Gordon Wood. The paperback version is an inexpensive way to have most of Paine's important writings at hand, including the letters on interesting subjects that are not always found in other collections.

We have it in our power to make the world over again!

This was a required reading for a graduate humanities class. John Keane's biography succinctly showed that Tom Paine (1737-1809) was the consummate revolutionary and a daring adventurer. Not only was he an important figure in the American Revolution, but he also traveled to France in 1791 to give that revolution a push. Paine traveled from England, just in time to stoke the flames of the revolution with his pamphlet Common Sense, in January 1776. To call Common Sense a sensation in the colonies is actually a bit of an understatement. It was an unparallel sensation and monumental work of Enlightenment rhetoric that quickly fanned the flames of rebellion throughout the colonies. In four months, over 120,000 copies were printed in the colonies--over 500,000 copies by years end. No other pamphlet printed in seventeenth century America came close to its success. Most importantly, Common Sense served to get the colonial patriots to drop their fear of open rebellion, and also emboldened those delegates who favored declaring independence from Britain. The delegates now had the confidence that a large segment of the colonists would support rebellion. Similar to the Declaration of Independence, the philosophical ideas in Common Sense are primarily from the English philosopher, John Locke (1632-1704). The most moving quote from the pamphlet became quite prophetic, when one considers the impact it ultimately had on the delegates in the congress, the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, and on the world. "We have it in our power to begin the world over again." This was required reading for a graduate course in the history of the French Revolution. For Thomas Paine, the eighteenth century was the Age of Enlightenment because for the first time humankind was throwing off the millstones of religious dogmatism and political despotism. Paine essentially believed that the rights of man encompassed, "...all the intellectual rights, or rights of the mind, and also all those rights of acting as an individual for his own comfort and happiness, which are not injurious to the natural rights of others" (Paine, 68). Paine's Rights of Man was an eloquent yet blistering rebuttal to Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France. Paine got right to the crux of the disagreement he had with Burke when he admonished him for his argument that governmental enactments of previous generations had the force and authority to bind citizens for all time. An example that Burke used was the English Parliament of 1688, which he praised as a model of the type of reform French citizens should emulate. Paine's answer was swift and cutting "Radical Enlightenment" reason. "Every age and generation must be as free to act for itself, in all cases, as the ages and generations which preceded it. The vanity and presumption of governing beyond the grave, is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies" (41-42). Paine also took Burke to task for his narrow