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John Smith- The General History of Virginia, New England and the Summer Isles. Profesor: Russell Di Napoli...

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JOHN SMITH (1580-1631) John Smith was an Englishman, who described the American natives through the topics and images of the Renaissance culture. He is believed to have been born in Lincolnshire, England, 1580. After a merchant’s apprenticeship, he decided on a life combat and served with the English Army Abroad. He was working as a soldier for hire. Smith eventually embarked on a campaign and there, he was captured and enslaved. He was sent to what is now Istanbul, and served a kindhearted mistress who, not wanting him to be her slave, sent him to her brother’s house, where he was forced to do farm work. After receiving harsh treatment from his Master, Smith killed him and escaped, eventually returning to England in the early 1600s. PURPOSE: Political intention. The work justifies the concept of “manifest destiny”, i.e. the notion that America made manifest the destined expansion of European civilization and, therefore, the Europeans had the right to take possession of the whole continent. “The General History of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles” (1624) The General History of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles is a book written by Captain John Smith, first published in 1624. The book is one of the earliest, if not the earliest, histories of the territory administered by the Virginia Company. The General History was based in large part on information he was given by others, as he had not personally witnessed what had happened in the years between his leaving Virginia and publishing the book. John Smith wrote his firsthand account of what he experienced in the New World. He wrote of the relationship between the colonists and the Native Americans. Smith wrote The General History of Virginia in his own opinion of the Native Americans. Smith’s The General History of Virginia shows the Native Americans as backward, barbaric, and dangerous. John Smith saw firsthand the hostile actions, different clothes, and inferior technology of the Native Americans. . Some of the Native Americans that inhabited the New World were hostile to the colonists. Smith was captured by the Native Americans and brought back to their camp.

When John Smith was captured by the Native Americans he wrote about their different, primitive clothing. He wrote that their leader, Powhatan “sat covered with a great robe made of raccoon skin and tails hanging by”. The other members of the tribe had “their heads and shoulders painted red” and their “heads bedecked with the white down of birds”. Compared to the colonists’ clothing, the Native Americans would have looked barbaric to Smith. The Native Americans inferior technology led to Smith writing that they were a “backwards” tribe. While being a captive of the Native Americans, Smith saw the Native Americans “marvel at the compass and the glass that covered it”. After Smith was escorted back to Jamestown to give Powhatan two cannons, Smith demonstrated how to use the cannon to the Native Americans and saw “the poor savages run away half dead with fear”. THE THIRD BOOK. CHAPTER I Captain Bartholomew Gosnold along with a crew of men, including Captain John Smith, sailed from Blackwall to Virginia on the 19th of December, 1606. Three ships were needed for the journey, which at first had been a struggle due to the poor weather. Along the way, they stopped at different places such as the Canaries or Dominica to trade or rest. Once they finally arrived at what they called Cape Henry, the first land they saw, they read orders. Gosnold, Smith and others were named to be the Council and had to choose a President. Master Wingfield was chosen and Captain Smith was not admitted in the Council. Every man was put to work to accommodate their stay, protect themselves and reload the ships. Smith was sent to discover the head of the river, and discovered Powhatan. They started being assaulted and ambuscaded by the savages. Captain Smith was restrained as a prisoner because they thought he wanted to murder the Council and make himself king. However, after the mischief, they reconciled and Captain Smith was admitted again to the Council. After that, the savages desired peace and Captain Newport returned to England the 15th of June, 1607 to provide news.

THE THIRD BOOK. CHAPTER II. WHAT HAPPENED TILL THE FIRST SUPPLY. Captain Smith explains the difficulties he had to overcome in order to prevent some of the colonists from returning to England, and how he had succeeded in providing much more food than they would have ever had in their home country. As the Council complained that Smith was too slow to discover the head of the Chickahominy River, he decided to undertake a very risky exploration which proved to be fatal for three of his men and ended up with his own captivity. When Captain Smith realised that he could not go on sailing up the river, he ordered his men to remain in their barge and wait for his return, but they went ashore and George Cassen was slain. He went higher upstream in a canoe with two Englishmen (John Robinson and Thomas Emry) and two Natives. The two Englishmen were killed while they were sleeping by the canoe and Smith was looking for food. According to his own account Smith himself was surrounded by “200 savages,” two of whom he managed to kill, and he claims that he was only slightly hurt. CHARACTERIZATION: Smith refers to some individuals by their names: - George Cassen:

He was tortured by the bowmen and told them that Captain Smith

had gone up the river. - Captain Smith: He claims that the bowmen who had killed Robinson and Emry did not dare to approach him until he was paralyzed with cold in the middle of a small river. After being captured, he offered a dial to Openchancanough the King of Pamunkey, and was honoured and well fed. When he was brought into Powhatan’s presence in the village of Werowocomoco, he was submitted to a ritual, in which he felt that his life had been at risk, and after that he remained in Werowocomoco making tools for Powhatan. - Robinson and Emry: They were shot with arrows and slain by the bowmen. - Openchancanough: He was called “the King of Pamunkey” by Smith. He conducted the 300 bowmen who captured Captain Smith, received a dial from him, and held the Captain in custody until he delivered the prisoner to Powhatan. - Powhatan: He was referred to as “the Emperor.” This Native chief wore a great robe made of raccoon skins.

- Queen of Appomattoc: She was appointed to bring Captain Smith water to wash his hands. - Pocahontas: She was one of Powhatan’s daughters, aged sixteen or eighteen. According to Captain Smith’s account, she took his head in her arms and laid her own head upon him to save him from death. What Pocahontas represents when she submits to the heroic conqueror attitude is the destruction of the Indian masculinity and the possibility for the conqueror to describe Indian men as either cruel savages or child-like creatures (feminized). Pocahontas symbolized the land that is feminized; thus, it could be taken by European conquerors as a woman expecting a man to be completed. That destroyed the native masculinity. We get the impression that Indian native men were lazy, they did not fulfill male activities, unable of standing face to face with a white male. Pocahontas is depicted in some instances as a half-naked woman showing her breasts and embracing John Smith in a maternal-erotic way because America, in Spanish and English texts, was represented as a virgin land, as a land to be exploited, conquered, sexually possessed, as a land full of richness to be taken by the conquerors. Also, America is sometimes depicted as a goddess of abundance with many children around her and her teats. - In this excerpt, all the individuals whose names are mentioned are characterized by their actions rather than by any detailed descriptions of their physical appearance. CHARACTERIZATION OF THE CAPTORS: - The author uses clearly derogatory terms to refer to his captors: “savages.” He explicitly compares them to “devils” that utter “hellish notes and screeches.” - He briefly describes their exotic physical appearance, focusing on how they decorate their bodies with red paint, animal skins, feathers, pieces of copper, white shells, and chains of beads. - He does not use direct or reported speech. We only learn about the captors from what he says they did. The Natives are not found engaging in conversation or articulately expressing their thoughts, but “singing and yelling out such hellish notes and screeches” and giving “a great shout.” - The author explains how he is alternatively threatened and treated as a guest.

- He is threatened: * When he is attacked by the same bowmen who have killed two of his men and uses his guide as his shield (this implies dehumanization of the Natives, as treated like objects). * When he is tied to a tree and is about to be shot with arrows. * When he is dragged before Powahtan and his head is placed on two great stones, while a number of people with clubs seem to be ready to beat his brains out.

- Captain Smith is treated as a valued guest: * When his captors pull him out of the icy bog, warm him up by rubbing his limbs by the fire and they admire the dial he offers to their leader. * When the armed captors lead him to Oropaks, to be “kindly feasted and well used”, and he is given a great amount of food. * At Werowocomoco, in Powhatan’s presence, when the Queen of Appomattoc and someone else bring him water and a bunch of feathers to wash and dry his hands, and he is well entertained once more. - The author tried to give the impression that the Natives were moody and totally unpredictable. The audience might easily understand why he was always unsure of his fate. They probably perceived this behaviour as primitive, extravagant and irrational. - The changing attitudes ascribed to Natives reinforced any existing prejudice about their mental instability, unreliability and treacherous nature. However, nowadays most readers tend to question these negative notions about Native Americans, realize their plight and feel inclined to sympathize with them rather than with the invaders of their territories. STYLE:

John Smith was just a soldier and therefore his style is quite simple, plain, and quick. He does many mistakes in spelling. He uses long sentences, strange punctuation, and Elizabethan English. He provides in his work some kind of images, myths, and tales. He doesn’t provide true information about the event that he mentions- for example when he is captured by Native Americans he exaggerates the whole situation. He also speaks in 3rd person for false modesty. RELATIONS: Smith wrote many accounts of his experience in Virginia and New England. Smith provided early examples of the tall tale and was among the first English-American writers to explore the important American themes of self-creation, practicality, industry, self-reliance, and cultural contact. In many ways, he is a precursor to Benjamin Franklin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt Whitman, and Mark Twain....