The Idea of America Reflections on the Birth of the United
States The preeminent historian of the Founding Era reflects on
the birth of American nationhood and explains why the American
Revolution remains so essential. For Pulitzer Prize-winning
historian Gordon S. Wood, the American Revolution is the most
important event in our history, bar none. Since American
identity is so fluid, we have had to continually return to our
nation’s founding to understand who we are. In a series of
illuminating essays, he explores the ideological origins of the
Revolution—from Ancient Rome to the European Enlightenment—and
the founders’ attempts to forge a democracy. He reflects on the
origins of American exceptionalism, the radicalism and failed
hopes of the founding generation, and the “terrifying gap”
between us and the men who created the democratic state we take
for granted. This is a profoundly revealing look at the event
that forged the United States and its enduring power to define
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