Artistic Merit in Mary Rowlandson's Narrative

A detailed Summary of Artistic Merit in Mary Rowlandson's Narrative

Artistic Merit in "A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson"

The Puritan community lived both piously and humbly. However, the Puritans were curiously drawn to the mysterious air of the wilderness and the wild natives that inhabited the America's interior. This mix of piety and adventure greatly affects Puritan literature. The captivity-narrative becomes most popular from the late seventeenth to early eighteenth century. In many of the captivity tales, cannibalistic Indians force puritans to abandon their homes and follow them in bondage into the uncharted wilderness. The tales are designed to illustrate a moral lesson, wherein a person survives his ordeal through an unwavering faith in God. As Richard Slotkin notes, "[One person, usually a woman], stands passively under the strokes of evil, awaiting rescue by the grace of God" (47). Indeed, many narratives follow this formula. One of the most popular stories following this archetype is Mary Rowlandson's "A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson. In!

the narrative, Rowlandson recounts her capture by the people of Metacomet during the period known as "King Phillip's War". Throughout the story, Rowlandson describes

All of the sensationalistic aspects of the bondage culminate in her buildup of suspense and drama. One way she helps build the suspense in the story is through her incorporation the English army into the story. The English soldier always seem to be on the heels of her captors but, like many stories of her kind, never seem to catch their target. At one point the Indians decide to abruptly leave their camp. Rowlandson realizes that their rush is due to the fact that "the English army [was near] and following them" (305). Later in the journey, the English again come and nearly rescue Rowlandson from her captivity. She states, "On that very day came the English army after [the Indians] to this river [near our camp], and saw the smoke of their wigwams, and yet this river put a stop to them" (307). Later on in her bondage, the English soldiers again make their presence known but can not save Rowlandson. As the group prepares to cross a river, the Indians suddenly break up an!

d one band takes Rowlandson and her group four to five miles up the river. She suspects that "the cause of this rout was [the] espying [of] some English scouts" (308). As Rowlandson points out, the English army is basically ineffective against the movement of the Indians. Their tracking of the Indians adds to the suspense of the story, however. The soldiers' incompetence is also compared to God. When the army loses Rowlandson's group at the river, she believes, "God did not give [the army] courage or activity to go over [the river] after us. We were not ready for so great a mercy as victory and deliverance. If we had been God would have found out a way for the English to have passed this river, as well as for the Indians with their squaws and children, and all of their luggage" (306). Obviously, Rowlandson's buildup of suspense and tension exemplifies the sensationalistic aspect of the narrative.

"I asked her to let me boil my piece of bear in her kettle, which she did, and gave me some ground nuts to eat it with; and I cannot think how pleasant it was to me. I have sometime seen bear baked very handsomely among the English, and some like it, but the thought that it was bear made me tremble. But now that was savory to me that one would think was enough to turn the stomach of a brute creature" (310).

In one of the more grotesque images of food, Rowlandson discusses the meal she has with a child. She comments, "The squaw was boiling horses feet; then she cut off me off a little piece, and gave one of the English children a piece also...The child could not bite it, it was so tough and sinewy, but lay sucking, gnawing, chewing, and slabbering of it in the mouth and hand. Then I took it of the child, and eat it myself, and savory it was to my taste" (318). The food imagery that Rowlandson uses in her narrative depicts the sensationalistic aspect of her story. The images c

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Approximate Word count = 1943
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: History