Our Dear Cousins the Americans: Sara Jeannette Duncan in Washington

As a young woman, Canadian author Sara Jeannette Duncan (1861–1922) spent nearly a year writing for the Washington Post on literary and cultural matters, and published many of her assessments of American society in The Week, Goldwin Smith's journal of Canadian affairs. Her articles repay close scrutiny not only for their inherent interest as witty observations of America by an engaged Canadian observer, but also for the manner in which they reveal Duncan's national preoccupations and biases. Approaching the Republic with neither antipathy nor deference, Duncan turned her newspaper sketches into an occasion for wide-ranging cultural comment on the nature of the republican experiment – especially concerning America's claims to freedom and human flourishing. She found the results encouraging, if not without salutary warnings, for Canadian efforts in the same direction.