New World, Inc.

The Making of America by England's Merchant Adventurers

De: John Butman, Simon Targett

Narrado por: Chris Kipiniak

Three generations of English merchant adventurers-not the Pilgrims, as we have so long believed-were the earliest founders of America. Profit-not piety-was their primary motive.

Some seventy years before the Mayflower sailed, a small group of English merchants formed "The Mysterie, Company, and Fellowship of Merchant Adventurers for the Discovery of Regions, Dominions, Islands, and Places Unknown," the world's first joint-stock company. Back then, in the mid-sixteenth century, England was a small and relatively insignificant kingdom on the periphery of Europe, and it had begun to face a daunting array of social, commercial, and political problems. Struggling with a single export-woolen cloth-the merchants were forced to seek new markets and trading partners, especially as political discord followed the straitened circumstances in which so many English people found themselves.

At first they headed east, and dreamed of Cathay-China, with its silks and exotic luxuries. Eventually, they turned west, and so began a new chapter in world history. The work of reaching the New World required the very latest in navigational science as well as an extraordinary appetite for risk. As this absorbing account shows, innovation and risk-taking were at the heart of the settlement of America, as was the profit motive. Trade and business drove English interest in America, and determined what happened once their ships reached the New World.

The result of extensive archival work and a bold interpretation of the historical record, New World, Inc. draws a portrait of life in London, on the Atlantic, and across the New World that offers a fresh analysis of the founding of American history. In the tradition of the best works of history that make us reconsider the past and better understand the present, Butman and Targett examine the enterprising spirit that inspired European settlement of America and established a national culture of entrepreneurship and innovation that continues to this day.

Reseñas de la Crítica

"As John Butman and Simon Targett remind us in their deeply researched and well-written New World, Inc., the Pilgrim venture was the outcome of English attempts over seven decades to reach the fabled East and Cathay (China)... ...Butman and Targett unapologetically describe the mercantile foundations of the Atlantic colonies."—Financial Times

"John Butman and Simon Targett explain the origins of America's colonies by examining London's businesses--especially those that attracted investors eager to explore opportunities abroad...[They] parse the kind of financial details that get lost in many similar histories."—Peter C. Mancall, Wall Street Journal

"This engrossing history of adventure and innovation, disclosing the true motive for America's founding, will appeal to all readers."—Library Journal, Starred Review

"Brisk and fascinating"—Foreign Affairs

"This is a beautifully presented and constructed book, with an arresting collection of colour pictures. It is fluently and elegantly written, and the reader is drawn from page to page, onwards through this fascinating story. In many ways it reads at times like a novel, but this is a serious piece of historical writing. Human interest and drama sit at the heart of this story, but it is also one of science, innovation, navigational daring, bravery, chance, and resilience. It is a story as exciting as it is revealing."—Mark Fox, Reaction

"New World, Inc. makes a good case for changing the conversation from religious to economic migration come November"—Rob Cox, Reuters Breakingviews

"A highly readable book that will open most readers' eyes to a fascinating and little known page of history."—Thomas Urquhart, The Press Herald

"Butman and Targett argue persuasively that the myth of America's founding narrative, centered on the Pilgrims' quest for religious freedom, ignores the reality of England's relationship to the New World in the 16th century... A lively and illuminating revisionist history."—Kirkus

""Butman and Targett are fluent storytellers with an eye for detail"—Publishers' Weekly

"This meticulously researched, well-written, and beautifully designed book tells the fascinating and largely untold story of the earliest days of globalization, of innovation and entrepreneurial risk-taking, and of the creation of some of the earliest venture-financed companies in the world."—Glenn Leibowitz, Write with Impact

Great narrator for interesting history

I love books that tell history from a different perspective and this fits the bill. This book was well researched and well paced. I learned a lot, the writing was good and the narrator did a great job. Kipiniak has a great voice that is clear and grips the reader\listener.

Commerce as Key in Early American History

This is a very illuminating book and deserves attention for the focus it brings to the centrality of Commerce/Capitalism in the founding of the North American colonies (and, indeed, of the U.S.). A long history of commercial interest in the New World is revealed by the authors, calling into question the notion of America as primarily a religious/democratic "City on a Hill." America was, according to these authors, first and foremost a resource to be exploited. Profit, not Puritanism or Political Gain, was the driving force behind the settlement of the North America. You can't listen to this well-written, well-sourced narrative of the pre-Colonial era and not appreciate that! Ultimately, the book also sheds light on who we are as a nation--a people who give almost preternatural value to the "entrepreneurial spirit." It's all there in the early modern history of the place.