Why a National Literature Cannot Flourish in the United States of North America — Context and Discussion

A People Not New, but a Literature Stalled

Rocchietti's first chapter establishes the central paradox: the American soil is new, but the people are not. He argues that the United States is composed of colonies from the old continent, carrying with them 'the very laws, religions, learning, languages, prejudices, arts, and literature of the old continent.' This inheritance, he claims, should make a national literature possible, yet it does not flourish. The problem, then, is not youth but something else—a failure of will or circumstance that the subsequent chapters will dissect.

The argument is structured as a series of negations: America is not a nation of Indians beginning civilization anew; it is not a blank slate. Rocchietti uses historical comparison to undermine the excuse of newness, pointing to the classical writers of mother countries as belonging to Americans as well. This move is typical of his method: he reframes the debate by shifting the ground from age to quality and independence.

Theatres, Newspapers, and the Shape of Public Taste

In chapters on American theatres and newspapers, Rocchietti turns to the institutions that shape public taste. He notes that ten years before his writing, theatres were 'thought immoral places,' and that Niblo's theatre was only frequented by the best class because it passed under the guise of a garden. This observation ties the state of the theatre to the reputation of literature itself: talented writers have not displayed their genius in drama because the stage is in bad repute.

He contrasts this with ancient Greece, where theatre was used to instruct and inculcate morals without preaching precepts. The implication is clear: American theatre, by failing to achieve moral seriousness, has abandoned a key branch of literature. Rocchietti's critique of newspapers is similarly pointed, though the excerpts only hint at his broader argument about their role in shaping a superficial literary culture.

Machiavelli, Travel Writers, and the Problem of National Prejudice

Rocchietti's defense of Machiavelli is one of the most striking passages in the excerpts. He takes issue with American writer J.T. Headley, who in his letters repeated the English slander that Machiavelli loved mankind for their contempt. Rocchietti counters that Il Principe is 'but a long irony,' and that Machiavelli was as noble a republican as Brutus or Cato. He calls for the word 'Machiavelism' to be removed from English and American dictionaries.

This episode illustrates a recurring concern: the dependence of American writers on British judgments. Rocchietti argues that a writer must write 'with the feeling of a citizen of the world,' and that national selfishness keeps literature in its clutches. He extends this to a broader point about intermarriage between nations improving the race, a curious biological metaphor for cultural cross-pollination.

The Structure of Argument: From Premise to Prescription

The book's ten chapters move from a general premise (the people are not new) through a series of specific critiques (fashionable literature, religious mixing, newspapers, tourists, theatres, politics, laws, religion) to a concluding chapter on international copyright. This structure is itself an argument: each chapter isolates a factor that prevents literature from flourishing, and the cumulative effect is a diagnosis of American culture as derivative and fragmented.

Rocchietti's method is to state a problem, offer evidence from observation or history, and then propose a corrective. For example, after criticizing travel writers who go abroad to show superiority, he concludes that 'a man of letters is indebted to all nations for his discrimination, and wisdom.' The final chapter on copyright is the most concrete prescription, suggesting that legal reform might remove one obstacle to literary independence.

Rocchietti's essay is best read as a series of interconnected arguments rather than a linear treatise. Readers may find it useful to track how each chapter returns to the central question of why American literature remains dependent on European models. The book's value lies less in its conclusions than in the specific observations—about theatre, travel writing, and the reception of Machiavelli—that reveal the texture of mid-19th-century American literary culture.

Rocchietti’s frustration with borrowed voices reminded me of evenings spent rereading old sea stories—lonely, northern, half-lit. The Captain of the Polestar, and Other Tales — A Reader’s Guide stirred the same quiet ache: the sense that some places never find their own words, only echoes of distant shores. That wistfulness lingers long after the page closes.