New York — For those who wonder if the American Revolution begins and ends with Mel Gibson's red-blooded "The Patriot," this spring might serve as an answer.
Several books about that event are coming out, including David McCullough's biography of John Adams, an anthology of writings compiled by the Library of America and Paul Lussier's debut novel, "Last Refuge of Scoundrels." Already a best seller is Joseph Ellis' "Founding Brothers," released last fall.
The latest works reveal the different ways in which the story can still be told. McCullough and Ellis look at the revolution's leaders. "Last Refuge of Scoundrels" and Ray Raphael's "A People's History of the American Revolution," the first of a series of "people's histories" published by the New Press, honor the unprivileged.
"If people could get a new slant on the American Revolution, I think they would find it very interesting," says series editor Howard Zinn, author of the best seller "A People's History of the United States."
For all the thousands of books and papers about the American Revolution, its meaning remains in great dispute. Historians have presented it as everything from a triumph of freedom over tyranny to a triumph of the propertied classes over the poor.
In a preface to Raphael's book, Zinn calls for a shifting of "history's lens" from George Washington and other leaders to "the masses of people who did the work that made society tick." Ellis, meanwhile, worries that the lens has already moved too far.
"If you go to some colleges and say, 'I want to write about Thomas Jefferson and political parties,' they look at you as if you're guilty of intellectual bankruptcy," Ellis says. "You're supposed to be writing about the peripheral figures.
"There ought to be people writing about the ordinary soldiers as well as the major figures; I don't want to make an exclusionary argument. But the center is the center and arguing the periphery is the center is kind of perverse."
Zinn and Ellis can both claim success. Zinn's "A People's History," a left-wing narrative that runs from the landing of Columbus to modern times, has sold more than half a million copies. The author is working with HBO on a film about the American Revolution, based on his book.
Ellis' "Founding Brothers" is his second straight best seller about the Revolutionary era, following the award-winning "American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson." He notes that last year's disputed presidential election raised interest in American history and that the election of George W. Bush, son of a president, made many curious about John Adams and his son, John Quincy Adams.
"Since 'Founding Brothers' came out, I've been getting 200 e-mails a week from people who said, 'I read your book and I feel like I never understood these fellows before. I always thought they were sculpted figures on Mount Rushmore,"' Ellis says.
"Some people at universities think there's nothing left to say about Washington and the other leaders, but I think there's a real hunger to learn about them."
Among the new works, only McCullough's is likely to reach a wide audience. That's because the Revolutionary War doesn't attract that kind of readership at least not like the Civil War or World War II. Not even movies help. "The Patriot" didn't have near the impact on sales as did Steven Spielberg's World War II epic "Saving Private Ryan."
According to Barnes & Noble, Civil War titles are popular throughout the South and the Mid-Atlantic region, while the market for American Revolution books is mostly confined to the Northeast. World War II books sell everywhere.
Ellis said one problem is that the revolution is only known through words and paintings while the Civil War has been defined by Matthew Brady's photographs.
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