Rowdy Carousals makes important interventions in nineteenth-century theatre history with regard to the Bowery Boy, a raucous, white, urban character most famously exemplified by Mose from A Glance at New York in 1848. Theatrical representations of the Bowery Boy emphasized the privileges of whiteness against nonwhite workers including enslaved and free African Americans during the Antebellum Period, an articulation of white superiority that continued through the early twentieth century with Jewish, Italian, and Chinese immigrants.
The book鈥檚 examination of working-class whiteness on stage, in the theatre, and in print culture invites theatre historians and critics to check the impulse to downplay or ignore questions about race and ethnicity in discussion of the Bowery Boy. J. Chris Westgate further explores links between the Bowery Boy鈥檚 rowdyism in the nineteenth century and the resurgence of white supremacy in the early twenty-first century.
鈥淲estgate鈥檚 book presents a new and exciting history of a well-known figure in theatre history, the Bowery Boy. His detailed and careful research illustrates the Bowery Boy鈥檚 enduring influence on the representation of white working-class men and how the figure became intertwined in debates over race, class, and immigration.鈥濃擬ichelle Granshaw, author, Irish on the Move: Performing Mobility in American Variety Theatre
鈥淓xploring some of the nineteenth century鈥檚 most popular theatricals, Rowdy Carousals reveals the importance of urban subcultures to American cultural history鈥攚ith their lively and sometimes troubling acts, Mose and his Bowery Boy cohort highlight the cross-class dynamics at the theatrical core of nineteenth-century philanthropy, urban tourism, and celebrity marketing.鈥濃擯eter Reed, University of Mississippi
