James Nelson Barker, an important early American playwright, was also a prominent political figure in Philadelphia, serving as a mayor of that city and later as comptroller of the U.S. Treasury. His father, John Barker, was influential in Philadelphia politics, also serving as mayor of the city. It is evident that his son felt conflicting desires to have a literary and a political career and that the political duties that he began to assume in his middle thirties finally took precedence over his writing. John W. Crowley has specified the year 1817 as a turning point for Barker. This was the year in which he joined the Board of Aldermen in Philadelphia and thus expressed his recognition that the call to public service and a political career outweighed his desire for a career as an author. As Crowley noted, "Ironically, only in the role that he repudiated (that...