New essays that illuminate and interpret William Bartram’s journey through what would become the southeastern United States
 
William Bartram, author of Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Muscogulees, or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws, was colonial America’s first native born naturalist and artist, and the first author in the modern genre of writers who portrayed nature through personal experience as well as scientific observation. His book, first published in 1791, was based on his journeys through southern Indian nations and Britain’s southern colonies in the years just prior to the American Revolution and provides descriptions of the natural and cultural environments of what would soon become the American South. Scholars and general readers alike have long appreciated Bartram’s lush, vivid prose, his clarity of observation and evident wonder at the landscapes he traversed, and his engagement with the native nations whose lands he traveled through.
 
The Attention of a Traveller: Essays on William Bartram’s “Travels” and Legacy offers an interdisciplinary assessment of Bartram’s influence and evolving legacy, opening new avenues of research concerning the flora, fauna, and people connected to Bartram and his writings. Featuring 13 essays divided into five sections, contributors to the volume weave together scholarly perspectives from geology, art history, literary criticism, geography, and philosophy, alongside the more traditional Bartram-affiliated disciplines of biology and history. The collection concludes with a comprehensive treatment of the book as a material historical artifact.
 

Kathryn H. Braund is Hollifield Professor of Southern History Emerita at Auburn University. She is author of Deerskins and Duffels: The Creek Indian Trade with Anglo-America, 1685–1815 and coeditor of William Bartram on the Southeastern Indians and Fields of Vision: Essays on the “Travels” of William Bartram; editor of Tohopeka: Rethinking the Creek War and the War of 1812; and coauthor of The Old Federal Road in Alabama: An Illustrated Guide.
 

“The diversity of contributions and the depth of knowledge in their several fields of specialization evidenced among the more than a dozen contributors are outstanding. . . . The book is as eclectic as its iconic subject, providing something of interest for all those intrigued by Bartram regardless of the many avenues of approach to his work and enduring legacy. Equally entertaining and thought-provoking, it helps us better understand the land he traveled both in its reality and as it has been imagined.“
—Mike Bunn, Director, Historic Blakely State Park and author of Fourteenth Colony: The Forgotten Story of the Gulf South During America’s Revolutionary Era

“Like its predecessor, Fields of Vision: Essays on the “Travels” of William Bartram, this collection distills the essence of a biennial meeting of the Bartram Trail Conference, and once again reflects the eclectic scholarly interests of that unique organization.”
—Gregory A. Waselkov, author of A Conquering Spirit: Fort Mims and the Redstick War of 1813–1814
 — -

"As readers of Bartram's Travels know, his book offers a unique view of just-pre-Revolutionary Colonial North America as the artist, naturalist, and social commentator traveled through five British colonies and three Native American homelands (which together make up eight modern states). This new book is the third compilation of works generated by the Bartram Trail Conference, in this case mostly from the 2017 event. The essays cover the less-studied Mississippi River sections of the Travels, the natural science observations that still contribute to modern biology, the natural science illustrations that constitute such a valuable part of the original work, the significance of the Conference itself, and the original publication of the Travels considered as an artifact and creation of its time and world. The contributing authors are an interdisciplinary mix of scholars, including several award winners. For collections focused on southern (US) history and biology, natural science illustration, and pre-Revolutionary War history, this is a strong candidate for acquisition. Recommended."
—CHOICE
 — -