Description

Israel Potter is not merely another good man adrift in a world devoid of goodness: he is, above all, an American, whose ideals and aims are derived from that same self-reliant democratic ethos which Whitman and Emerson were later to celebrate. Hired laborer, farmer, chain bearer, hunter, trapper, Indian trader, merchant sailor, whaler, soldier, courier, spy, carpenter, and beggar, through it all, Israel remains the American, the man who, even in the hardships of exile, insists that all will be well once he can again walk on American ground.

Israel Potter is not merely another good man adrift in a world devoid of goodness: he is, above all, an American, whose ideals and aims are derived from that same self-reliant democratic ethos which Whitman and Emerson were later to celebrate. Hired laborer, farmer, chain bearer, hunter, trapper, Indian trader, merchant sailor, whaler, soldier, courier, spy, carpenter, and beggar, through it all, Israel remains the American, the man who, even in the hardships of exile, insists that all will be well once he can again walk on American ground.