Perambulations in Print

Abstract

Abstract This chapter examines the only remaining copy of Jonathan Plummer’s life narrative (1796–1798) to argue that his local notoriety as a “hermaphrodite”—a charge he disseminated through his public declamations that he circulated in print—articulates a masculinity in conflict with the norms he actively tried to meet. After being established as a poet through the patronage of the eccentric “Lord” Timothy Dexter (examined in Chapter 3), Plummer proceeded to narrate how his dreams and his hearing of divine voices set him apart from the masses. This chapter focuses on how Plummer’s example disturbs a series of norms regarding print—specifically, its connection to constituting privacy—that inform scholarly writings on the public sphere.