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The Muse of the Revolution: The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony’s landmark book on extraordinary women hailed Founding Mother Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814) for her support not only for the freedom of American men but for “that of her own sex also.”   In this lively biography of the first female historian of the American Revolution and our first woman playwright, Nancy Rubin Stuart depicts Mrs. Warren’s life and patriotic achievements.

The sister of firebrand James “the Patriot” Otis, who first declared that “taxation without representation is tyranny,” Mrs. Warren was the mother of five sons and the wife of James Warren, Speaker of the Massachusetts House and Paymaster General of the Revolutionary Army. In 1775 the learned Mrs. Warren served as her husband’s private secretary at headquarters in Watertown, Massachusetts where she heard news about the Revolution that few men—and virtually no women—enjoyed.

A close friend of Abigail and John Adams, she and Abigail shared fears, comforted each other in their husbands’ absences, exchanged theories about child-rearing and even ran a small importing business together. John Adams, who was impressed with Mrs. Warren’s acumen and literary abilities, praised her “real genius,” encouraging her to write satirical plays, poems, and a history of the American Revolution. After reading her three volume History of the Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution (1805), however, Adams exploded and, in one of ten blistering letters, accused her of having a “determined resolution” to denigrate his role in the Revolution. This eye-opening biography reveals their complex relationship—and why it unraveled.

The Muse of the Revolution captures Mrs. Warren’s bold interactions with other notables of American history, among them Sam Adams, Henry Knox, Benjamin Lincoln, Hannah Winthrop, Elbridge Gerry and George and Martha Washington.

Mrs. Warren satirized the British and American Loyalists in her popular plays and poems and authored an influential critique of the U.S. Constitution,  whose principles later appeared in the Bill of Rights. Nancy Rubin Stuart reveals how Mrs. Warren’s provocative writing made her an exception to the largely voiceless women of the eighteenth century, and persuasively argues for her legacy to be understood and appreciated by a new generation.