All Clever Men, Who Make Their Way

MICHAEL O’BRIEN was Reader in American Intellectual History at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Jesus College. He is founder of the Southern Intellectual History Circle and series editor of the Publications of the Southern Texts Society. O’Brien is the author or editor of several books on southern intellectual history, including the Bancroft Prize-winner, Conjectures of Order.

All Clever Men Who Make Their Way deserves a serious reading. Surveying the problems students of southern antebellum thinking face, which include the anonymity of many essayists, O'Brien's lively introduction sheds light on the society itself.