Nancy,
Thank you for this thoughtful piece. It certainly sheds a different light on Jefferson.  I am going to look for that book in my library. 

Very interesting.

Anita 

> Date: Mon, 5 May 2008 10:09:50 -0400
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Jefferson's Overseer
> To: [log in to unmask]
> 
> I suspect plenty of widowers do it, even today [live celibate lives].  
> People can and do "turn it off" when times require. But in TJs case,  
> we'll never know. I do want to throw another log on the fire here and  
> ask what any of you think about his depiction in "Dominion of  
> Memories", by Susan Dunn. It's an interesting book, on some levels I  
> find it annoyingly on the mark, many of the attitudes she describes  
> still exist here in Va, and can make you want to tear your hair out  
> in frustration. But it also seems she takes an excessively negative  
> view, or paints with too broad a brush. Perhaps the fact that Va [and  
> the Carolinas] endured 3 wars in 90 years also had something to do  
> with their "backwardness."
> 
> But I find her depiction of TJ surprising, having grown up with him  
> shown on a pedestal all my life. He seems to have had his "moments in  
> the sun" where he did great things, mainly in areas where his  
> intellect could shine. Those thought processes seemed to have been  
> very idealistic, which was what we needed during the Revolutionary  
> period. But then he retired to Monticello and lived in splendid  
> isolation, handing down his idealism in the form of stultifying  
> edicts about the good old days and staying true to one's agrarian  
> roots. If true, he did his state a great disservice and was really in  
> no position to be directing the course Virginia was taking, with all  
> his theories that were growth- damaging, not growth-enhancing. If he  
> truly did see himself as the Sage of Monticello, trying to direct the  
> course of his state as he once directed the course of the new nation,  
> let's face it, he might have seen himself on a different plane than  
> as a sexually frustrated plantation owner sleeping with a slave  
> woman. It seems to me his ideals and thoughts in his retirement  
> became, as so often happens with the older folks, more and more  
> inward looking and conservative. A weed to entangle the only  
> political dominion he had left, Virginia, and not the flowering of  
> liberty it once was. From Ms. Dunn's depiction it makes me wonder if  
> his conservative elder self had been plopped down in 1770s  
> Philadelphia, what position he would have taken-- Patriot or Tory?  
> But it seems to me his character was one rooted in idealism and the  
> intellect; all his tinkering and planting at Monticello was because  
> his inquiring intellect wanted to Know Things. Satisfying that  
> intellectual craving seemed to be a big motivator in his life [which  
> brings up the side question of how big a motivator physical needs  
> were in the man-- sex, fine foods, excellent wines]. But as he was  
> more isolated from the busy-ness of the world, his ideals took on an  
> increasingly impractical tone. One must also then ask, as a legend in  
> his own mind, if he would have slept with a "mere slave", and if his  
> passion for Mrs. Cosway was in large part an idealism, the "perfect  
> love", etc.
> 
> Jes' askin'
> 
> Nancy
> 
> -------
> I was never lost, but I was bewildered once for three days.
> 
> --Daniel Boone
> 
> 
> 
> On May 5, 2008, at 12:01 AM, Stephan A. Schwartz wrote:
> 
> > I think Nancy is correct.  There is not a scintilla of evidence  
> > that Jefferson  was asexual. It is undeniable that Martha and  
> > Thomas Jefferson had an active and apparently satisfying sex life,  
> > and his attraction to Maria Cosway tells us he was not of a  
> > celibate inclination.   Are we to assume then that for the  
> > remaining two-thirds of his life he was a chronic masturbator? Ask  
> > yourself, are you prepared to live for half a century without a  
> > sexual relationship, or without lying in bed cuddling the man or  
> > woman you are sleeping with? If the answer is yes, you should  
> > consider life in the Roman clergy. It's better than tenure.
> >
> > -- Stephan
> >
> >
> > On 4 May 2008, at 22:17, Anne Pemberton wrote:
> >
> >> Nancy,
> >>
> >> I fail to see how noting that he was a sexual person is "trashing  
> >> him".
> >>
> >> As a widower, we would expect a healthy male to make some  
> >> provisions for sexual outlets. There were all sorts of taboos back  
> >> then for "taking matters in hand". NOT providing such an outlet  
> >> could have made TJ a rather dour man who was not capable of the  
> >> leadership that he exhibited.
> >>
> >>
> >
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