WORKS IN PROGRESS

Corrections to Previous Books

Forthcoming Books:

Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation (to be published by Alfred A. Knopf in 2011). Historians Alfred Young, Gary Nash, and Ray Raphael have engaged 22 leading scholars to contribute original biographical essays on people who promoted radical causes during the Founding Era. Although these men and women shared no single agenda, many resisted the concentration of power in the hands of the few. Many believed that “liberty” meant “liberty for all” or that the notion of equality should be applied to political, economic, and religious spheres. Often, they embraced the notion of  “democracy.” In the context of the times, such perspectives were considered radical. By contrast, the traditional “Founding Fathers” did not apply the concept of liberty across the board, approached the notion of equality only cautiously, and for the most part considered democracy suspect.

The “revolutionary founders” promoted and exemplified ideals more in keeping with our values today, yet they rarely make an appearance in standard texts. The core narrative of our nation’s history makes no acknowledgment of a radical presence during the founding era, which Americans often consult as they define the ideals of the nation. It usually dates the radical or progressive tradition as beginning in the mid-nineteenth century. Revolutionary Founders will present a new reading of the Revolution, a fresh look at a generation of radical thinkers and doers who helped shape our nation at the outset.

Inventing the American President (to be published by Alfred A. Knopf on Presidents' Day 2012). Unlike other treatments of this subject, Raphael's narative will cover not only the Federal Convention, but also the precedents before 1787; the views of people out-of-chambers, including Antifederalists, whose doubts the “Framers” needed to assuage; and the interactions between presidents and their various constituencies during the first three administrations. 

The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Founding Fathers and the Birth of the Nation (coming out in 2011). This is real history in a familiar and popular format, one of those yellow books you see on every topic.

History for Elementary and Middle School. The American Revolution is a featured story in elementary and middle school curricula, and how we narrate it at that initial stage is crucial. Children are better off learning that Paul Revere was a patriot in a highly organized and well prepared resistance network—and not that mythic lone rider who woke up sleepy-eyed farmers. A host of stories can introduce an empowering civic lesson, showing that history is not made solely by a select set of superior men but also by a multitude, once called “the body of the people.” Ray and his wife, Marie Raphael, middle school teacher and author of young adult novels (Streets of Gold and Boy from Ireland) will produce materials that appeal to this youthful audience and are valuable classroom resources.

Textbook Improvement. There is no reason history textbooks should be perpetuating nineteenth century mythologies in the twenty-first century. Ray continues to work to update our core narrative of the American Revolution. See Rate Your Textbook.

The Grammar of History. Why and how do people’s histories get hidden by the myth-making inherent in story-telling and nation building? What is it about our linguistic habits, our memory, our collective psyche, and our social/political structures that makes us reduce the contributions of the many to the legends of the few? In the dynamics of historical processes, what is the relationship between the individual and the group? How do individuals affect history, and how are they affected by history? How are some individuals chosen for the core narrative, while others are forgotten? Who makes that choice? What do we gain and loose by transforming group dynamics into tales of personal achievement — and why is this tendency so difficult to resist? Can we take what is positive about mythology and somehow integrate it into a responsible telling of history? While some of these questions are raised and briefly discussed in previous works, and Raphael’s narrative works reflect these concerns, he hopes someday to tackle them directly on the analytical level.