Culture Clashes in Rowlandson's Narrative

Paper Summary:

The paper explains how Mary Rowlandson's "The Narrative of the Captivity and the Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson," is what Harvey Pierce labels a "religious confessional" and a "visceral thriller". The paper shows, however, how her work goes far beyond the genre of a captivity narrative and instead suggests the monumental cultural gap between Native-Americans and the English.

From the Paper:

"From the epic poetry of Homer to the historical logs of Thucydides, the victor has always earned the right to function as the historical storyteller. In her short book, "the Narrative of the Captivity and the Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson," however, it is not the victors, but rather the captive who writes history. Because of this, Rowlandson's work can be considered a monumental piece of literature. In fact, University of California professor Harvey Pierce writes that this type of work, later called the captivity novel, has an important function in the literary realm as a piece of historical literature in which "historical fact" becomes second to "what the narrative was for the readers from whom it was written" (Pierce 1). Pierce notes that "what the narrative was" for its readers can range from "religious confessional" to "visceral thriller;" and Rowlandson's work exhibits a bit of both of these extremes (1). In fact, Rowlandson uses both the themes of "religious [confession]" and "visceral thriller" to establish the cultural gap between herself and the Native Americans."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Pierce, Harvey. "The Significance of the Captivity Narrative." American Literature. 19.1 (1947): 1-20.
• Rowlandson, Mary. A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson. Baym, Nina. Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter Ed. Urbana-Champaign: University of Illinois, 2003.
• "Native Voices" 2008. American Passages: A Literary Survey. 20 June 2008. <http://www.learner.org/amerpass/unit01/usingvideo.html>.

More papers on Culture Clashes in Rowlandson's Narrative:

• Book Review # 111650 : "Mary Rowlandson's Narrative"
• Film Review # 150389 : "Culture Clash in "Last Resort" and "Lost in Translation"

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