The Captivity Narrative and Mary Rowlandson

1. The Captivity Narrative and Mary Rowlandson

2. What Is a Captivity Narrative? • American Indian captivity narratives • Stories of men and, particularly, women • Of European descent • Popular in both America and Europe • White woman’s captivity by natives a metaphor for New England’s experience in the New World • Anxiety of female captivity: that she may choose to stay, become part of the community

3. Are Captivity Narratives Historical? • Often based on true events • Contained fictional elements • Some entirely fictional • created because the stories were popular

4. Captivity Narrative’s Purpose • Religious expression • Justification of westward expansion • Popular symbol of American national heritage • Reinforcement of stereotypes • Spanish: Indians as brutish beasts • French: Indians as souls needing redemption • English in Virginia: innocent exotics • Puritans: Satanic threat to religious utopia

5. Themes • Fears of cannibalism • Fears of scalping • Hunter-predator myth: captive caught between savagery and civilization • For Puritans: Israel suffering under Babylonian captivity • Freudian view: captivity becomes adoption (Puritan/Indian friendship development)

6. Pattern • Separation • attack and capture • Torment • ordeals of physical and mental suffering • Transformation • accommodation, adoption • Return • escape, release, redemption

7. The Puritan Worldview • Providence: History is ordered according to God’s plan • Typology: Biblical events and figures serve as types for historical events and figures • Doctrine of predestination: The sovereignty and goodness of God • Election: The covenant of grace • Uncertain salvation: Looking for signs

8. The Narrative as Myth • Captivity as exceptional and exemplary • A singular experience and test • A moral and religious lesson for readers • Biblical frame of reference • Captivity as symbolic conversion • Collapse of boundaries • Wandering in the wilderness • Test and conversion • Restoration

9. Captivity and the Revolution • Popular beyond Puritan era and region • Colonies seen as captives of British Crown • King George = savage • Americans as chosen people being tested

10. Captivity Narrative as Critique of Europeans • Not just English genre • Captive identifies with captor • Captivity narrative threatened the collapse of boundaries between • home and captor culture • between white and native identity

11. Readers Love • Details of Indians’ lives • Gory descriptions • Descriptions of wilderness • Threats of sexual violation • Individual Christian struggles • Captivity narratives forerunners of dime novels, sensational true crime stories, and reality television

12. The Wilderness • Does not equal no people • Equals being unsure of one’s place • Typical European response • Reassert one’s old sense of place • family, social standing, religion, Bible • Learn the new place • social order, cuisine, language • Improvise spaces to inhabit • Unhoused especially receptive to the dangers of the wilderness

13. King Philip’s War (1675-76) • “King Philip” (Metacom) becomes leader of Wampanoags & creates a coalition to resist the English • In 1675 Philip puts an informer to death; the English retaliate & kill three. War breaks out • 600 English & 3,000 Indians die by war’s end, brought about by widespread starvation among Indians & Philip’s death

14. King Philip’s War & Religion • Puritan interpretation: God’s judgment on New England for its sins • Jeremiad: sermon that castigated the people for the sins; compared them unfavorably to predecessors • Mary Rowlandson’s text as Jeremiad

15. Mary Rowlandson’s True History • International bestseller. • Most famous example of the “Indian captivity narrative” • First and only work by its author • Retells 11 weeks, 5 days that a minister’s wife spends among the Wampanoag people

16. Rowlandson as a Captive Puritan Woman • Rowlandson’s position • Family (born in England 1637; arrived in Salem in 1639; mother active in church) • Marriage and social standing • Rowlandson copes with captivity • Skills and activities • Survival strategies • Comparison with other captives

17. Rowlandson’s narrative • Puritan conventions barred women from writing for publication and unauthorized public speaking • Rowlandson’s motives • Title page • Comments in text

18. Plot of Rowlandson’s Narrative • Lose home • Lose family • Dwell in Wilderness • Regain family • Regain home

19. Representative Affliction • Rowlandson’s afflictions those of New England’s • God’s special notice of Rowlandson and his chosen people • Rowlandson an example for others: how to persevere and remain faithful in a time of great suffering

20. Unintentional Commentary? • Rowlandson describes her adventures using the values, language, and assumptions appropriate to her “place.” • Despite herself, she shows us the following: • The Wampanoags remarkably generous, despite their desperate circumstances • The Wampanoags far from immoral • Rowlandson successful in creating “space” for herself (sewing); no passive victim • English bungled in how they’ve handled the situation

21. Sources • Burnham, Michelle. Captivity and Sentiment: Cultural Exchange in American Literature, 1682-1861. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1997. • Derounian, Kathryn Zabelle. "The Publication, Promotion, and Distribution of Mary Rowlandson's Indian Captivity Narrative in the Seventeenth Century." Early American Literature 23.3 (1988): 239-61. • Gookin, Daniel. "An Historical Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians in New England." 1677. Archaeologia Americana: Transactions and Collections of the American Antiquarian Society Vol. 2 (1836): 423-523. • Mather, Increase. A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England.London: Chiswell, 1676. • Salisbury, Neal, ed. and intro. The Sovereignty and Goodness of God, Together with the Faithfulness of His Promises Displayed: Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson, and Related Documents. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1997. • Slotkin, Richard. Regeneration Through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600-1860. Middleton, CT: Wesleyan UP, 1973.