William Bartram

An item at American Writers Museum

Born to a family with its own private botanical gardens, William Bartram developed a lifelong love of nature. In 1773, he set out on a four-year expedition through the southern colonies to study plants and animals. His Travels Through North & South Carolina, Georgia, East & West Florida, the Cherokee Country (1791) illustrates and describes what he saw, including the Native American communities he encountered.

Bartram was the first American author to write a natural history from an emotional, first-person perspective. His poetic descriptions of nature in Travels helped romanticize the American landscape.

AMERICAN VOICES

An exhibit at American Writers Museum

American writing is distinctive, diverse, and comes in many forms from across the nation. The 100 authors featured here represent the evolution of American writing. Learn more about each writer on the timeline by turning the panels below their portraits. Explore centuries of writing by pulling, turning, and touching the interactive elements on the counter.

This is not meant to be a list of the greatest or most influential writers. Instead, we present authors and works as part of the American story as it grows and changes. Taken together, this rich literary heritage reflects America in all of its complexity: its energy, hope, conflict, disillusionment, and creativity.

American Writers Museum