The Michelle Smith Lecture Series
The Cause: The American Revolution and its Discontents 1773-1783
For more than two centuries, historians have debated the history of the American Revolution, disputing its roots, its provenance, and above all, its meaning.
These questions have intrigued Ellis—one of our most celebrated scholars of American history—throughout his entire career. With this much-anticipated volume, he at last brings the story of the revolution to vivid life for our modern era.
Completing a trilogy of books that began with Founding Brothers, The Cause returns us to the very heart of the American founding, telling the military and political story of the war for independence from the ground up, and from all sides: British and American, loyalist and patriot, white and Black.
Taking us from the end of the Seven Years’ War to 1783, and drawing on a wealth of previously untapped sources, The Cause interweaves action-packed tales of North American military campaigns with parlor-room intrigues back in England, creating a thrilling narrative that brings together a cast of familiar and long-forgotten characters.
Joseph J. Ellis
Joseph J. Ellis is one of the nation's leading scholars of American history.
He is the best-selling author of twelve books, including American Sphinx, which won the National Book Award, and Founding Brothers, which won the Pulitzer Prize. His in-depth chronicle of the life of our first president, His Excellency: George Washington, was a New York Times bestseller.
He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts, and Plymouth, Vermont.