Gary Shteyngart Tours Monticello With 12-Year-Old Son as 250th Anniversary Nears

1 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Jun 18

Gary Shteyngart visited Monticello with his 12-year-old son, Johnny, framing the trip as a way to examine American identity before the Declaration of Independence’s 250th anniversary.
Monticello becomes the vehicle for that exploration: Shteyngart describes Jefferson’s home as both an Enlightenment achievement and a site marked by slavery, including the handprints of an enslaved child in its brickwork.
Shteyngart, born in the Soviet Union, contrasts his own immigrant experience in the early 1980s with his native-born son’s upbringing in a period he calls one of national uncertainty and angst.
The essay is the seventh installment in a New York Times travel series using places tied to the founding era to revisit the country’s history ahead of the 2026 milestone.

Sources

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