America at the Great Exhibition of 1851
1951; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 3; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/3031236
ISSN1080-6490
Autores Tópico(s)Historical Art and Culture Studies
ResumoTHERE are several ways of looking at the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations, which opened at Paxton's Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, on May 1, 1851. Until not long ago it was commonly derided as a collection of hideous Victoriana, running in scale all the way from the colossal statue of the Queen (in zinc) to a set of carved fruit-stones submitted by the Prince Consort's brother, Ernest of Coburg-Gotha. More recently, the Exhibition has come to be admired for its embodiment of an age which may have been lacking in taste but had certainly no lack of gusto. Or, leaving out the question of taste, the Exhibition can be considered as a technological display, not the least interesting item of which is the building in which it was housed. By contemporaries it was often taken as a gauge of the relative prowess, cultural and technological, of the exhibiting nations. It is this last aspect that I wish to discuss, in terms of the United States. How did America acquit herself in comparison with the rest of the world, and especially with Britain? Before an answer to the question can be attempted, something must be said of British opinions of the United States. In the 1840's Britain was not so much ignorant of America as misinformed. At all events, she did not ignore what went on across the Atlantic; indeed, the newspapers of 1851 devoted quite as much space to America as do those of 1951. The United States was subjected to an uneasy or scornful, but nevertheless constant, scrutiny. The British press naturally reported what it thought would most appeal to its readers, and the picture presented was in most cases unfavorable. Americans were either slaveholders, or connived at slavery. They were crude and boast-
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