THE MUSE OF THE REVOLUTION:

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

by Nancy Rubin Stuart


Nancy at the statue of Mercy Otis Warren

About the Author

Nancy Rubin Stuart is an energetic author and journalist whose latest book, The Muse of the Revolution: The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation Beacon Press published in hardcover in 2008 and in paperback in 2009.

Last June the book received the 1699 Historic Winslow House Award. While researching Mrs. Warren's life, Nancy was awarded a William Randolph Hearst Fellowship from the American Antiquarian Society.

Among Nancy's previous titles are the award-winning The Reluctant Spiritualist: The Life of Maggie Fox , the best-selling American Empress: The Life and Times of Marjorie Merriweather Post ,and Isabella of Castile: The First Renaissance Queen ,a featured dividend of the Book-of-the-Month Club.

Nancy began her writing career as a stringer for the New York Times (under the bylines Nancy Rubin and Nancy Rubin Stuart) and published in magazines before composing her first book.

She is the mother of two daughters, three stepchildren and is an involved step grandmother to two toddlers. Nancy and her husband recently moved from Manhattan to Cape Cod.

Currently writing a new book, Nancy serves as the 2010 director of the Cape Cod Writers Center Conference.


THE MUSE OF THE REVOLUTION:
The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation
(Boston: Beacon Press, 2008, 2009)

REVIEWS


A riveting biography of one of America's boldest and most influential-but least recognized-Founding Mothers.

"This wonderfully researched and readable book has done an excellent job of giving another view of what it took to make this country. Essential for academic and public libraries. Enjoy!"
Library Journal, May 1, 2008
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“This commendable biography follows the life of New England patriot Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814), the celebrated—and sometimes reviled—writer of poems, plays, history and satire...Warren emerges as a fully fleshed-out woman with literary insecurities, intractable opinions and a high-strung temper as well as deep affection for her husband and sons. Stuart includes fascinating period details, focusing primarily on Warren's home-front experiences of rampant inflation, scarcity of goods, high taxes and profiteering during the Revolution as well as typical 18th-century illnesses and family anxieties. Most poignantly, Stuart depicts Warren's loneliness and despair after the deaths of three of her five sons. This account is valuable as an eyewitness play-by-play of the American Revolution and will be a great resource to scholars of women's and literary history."
Publisher's Weekly, May 5, 2008

"Concise and readable... focuses on a founding mother who wrote in part because that was the one way a woman could contribute to the Revolution...there's plenty in Stuart's pages for those interested in the drama of the woman writer in Western culture."
Boston Globe, June 29, 2008

"This dramatic biography makes it clear that future President Adams relied extensively upon advice from his wife, Abigail, as well as upon the guidance of Mercy Otis Warren...As Stuart demonstrates , Warren was a woman of independent hopes and dreams who believed strongly that she could express important ideas to the new American republic with her writing. Thankfully, she was right."
American Spirit, The Magazine of the Daughters of the American Revolution, July/August 2008

"Incredible source data, smooth narratives built around chapters, fragmented around specific moments, and intricate use of historical detail and setting...Stuart breathes new life into an early American poet and historian too often left out of historical discussion."
Metro Spirit, Augusta, Georgia, July 2, 2008

"Nancy Rubin Stuart, the author of several popular biographies, presents Warren in a colorfully anecdotal style. Given the difficulty of reconstructing warren's life, Stuart has artfully set the story in the context of the Revolution and relied upon her subject's friendships, especially with the Adamses. The pace is brisk, if not jaunty... As a lively introduction to the great Mercy Otis Warren, this book is appealing."
Wilson Quarterly