Common Sense
The book that created the modern United States, Paine's incendiary call for Americans
to revolt against British rule converted millions to the cause of independence and set out
a vision of a just society - free from corrupption and cronyism - which remains inspiring
today.
Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we
see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution.
They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and
destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals
and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization, and helped make us who we are.
Thomas Paine was born in Thetford, England, in 1737, the son of a
staymaker. He had little schooling and worked at a number of jobs, including tax
collector, a position he lost for agitating for an increase in excisemen's pay. Persuaded
by Benjamin Franklin, he emigrated to America in 1774. In 1776 he began his American
Crisis series of thirteen pamphlets, and also published the incalculably influential
Common Sense, which established Paine not only as a truly revolutionary thinker, but as
the American Revolution's fiercest political theorist. In 1787 Paine returned to Europe,
where he became involved in revolutionary politics.
In England his books were burned by the public hangman. Escaping to France, Paine took
part in drafting the French constitution and voted against the king's execution. He was
imprisoned for a year and narrowly missed execution himself. In 1802 he returned to
America and lived in New York State, poor, ill and largely despised for his extremism and
so-called atheism (he was in fact a deist). Thomas Paine died in 1809. His body was
exhumed by William Cobbett, and the remains were taken to England for a memorial burial.
Unfortunately, the remains were subsequently lost.
104 pages, Paperback