Monticello Book Launch, 9 November 2010

9th November, 2010

A book launch was held at Monticello’s Jefferson Library for Julie Flavell’s When London Was Capital of America. Dr Flavell’s talk, ‘Why Georgian London Needs an American Makeover’, began at 4pm, followed by a reception and book signing at 5.

Summary: Georgian London is considered to be quintessentially British, but the eighteenth century was a time when American influences were stronger than ever in the capital of the British empire. Focussing on the story of a South Carolina plantation owner and his slave in London in the 1770s, Dr Flavell shows that colonial Americans were becoming an accepted part of the London scene just before the American
Revolution, but they were also provoking challenging questions about the contradictions between British liberty and an empire founded on slavery.