Taylor, Alan. The City of William Cooper: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early Republic. New York: Random House, Inc., 1995. A book review by Jonesia WilkinsWhen writing William Cooper's Town, Alan Taylor connects local history with political, economic, and cultural patterns widespread in the early republic, evaluates the balance of the American Revolution as demonstrated by the background of a protruding family and blend the history of frontier settlement with the visualization and reconstitution of that experience in literature. Taylor achieves these goals through a vivid and dramatic fusion of narrative and analytical history. His book will authoritatively engage and regale readers in many ways, especially for its compelling and memorable portrayal of two key subjects: William Cooper, the frontier entrepreneur and city builder, and his youngest son, the theorist James Fenimore Cooper , which shaped his narrative novel. representation of family history through accounts such as The Pioneers (1823). While William Cooper's Town is quick to get close, its fluid, rapid-fire narrative is virtually relentless in its focus on one overarching theme: the pursuit of ostentatious status in a republic that subscribed to democratic values ​​but remained bound to hierarchical conceptions of gregarious value arising from colonial history. By building the story around the terms "rise," "power," and "legacy," Taylor reflects William Cooper's elevation from penury and ambiguity to great wealth and influence and, ultimately, his frivolous theft of the family fortune through a accumulation of restless exaggeration and transgression. and transmuting economic circumstances beyond his control. Cooper's goal to perpetuate his state... middle of paper... seeing his sister Hannah in a riding situation and the way his memory influenced the portrayal of the female character in The Pioneers Taylor contests the Cooper's claim in the 1830 book that his novel has to do with his family, attributing this denial to the novelist's discomfort with the authenticity of a boisterous, democratic Cooperstown in contrast to the harmonious and deferential Templeton of the narrative. Alan Taylor wrote the book, William Cooper's Town so rich in structure and implicative insinuation that it is difficult to do it justice in a brief review. His work defies simple categorization as it moves seamlessly between the world of William Cooper and that of his novelist son. Taylor deserves the highest recognition for helping us rethink the nature of historians' art by transporting us to a particular frontier of the early American republic..