Thomas Jefferson’s 'Notes on the State of Virginia': A Prolegomena

Dr. Holowchak, one of the world's foremost Jefferson scholars, has once again written an intriguing new book on Thomas Jefferson. This time he scrutinizes Jefferson's famous book, “Notes on the State of Virginia,” and does it with exemplary care. Holowchak begins with other historians' assessments of the book and continues with accounts of the process of Jefferson's writing, the book's publication history and its reception. Then follows a step-by-step uncovering of Jefferson's actual philosophical and political purposes in putting together this classic text of the late Enlightenment. There is much to learn from Holowchak's thorough knowledge and informed interpretations of Jefferson's early ideas about nature, the sublime, natural human rights, empiricism, ethics, and, of course, politics—including his lifelong plan for the emancipation of slaves. In addition to learning about eighteenth-century American and European intellectual history in general, the reader gains a number of new insights into the famously most complicated founding father of the United States.

Ari Helo

University of Helsinki, Finland