Amazon.com
On the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, you won't want to confuse Matthew Sharpe's new novel by that name with the many commemorative histories that are coming out alongside it. In this gleefully anachronistic and deeply scatological tale, history repeats itself in a post-apocalyptic future that's as violent as the past. Sharpe connects many of the familiar historical dots (Pocahontas saves Captain John Smith and falls for John Rolfe, for example), but his settlers don't arrive from across the Atlantic in search of new land for tobacco: they flee a Manhattan where the Chrysler Building has just collapsed and the water is poison, driving an armored bus down the ruins of I-95 in search of the supplies of gas and clean food that they hope the territory of Virginia might provide. Amid the gore and smut, you'll find a surprisingly touching love story, starring a restless, de-Disneyed, and thoroughly charming Pocahontas, and thrillingly inventive language on every page that skims from Elizabethan archaism to IM slang and back, often in the same sentence. --Tom Nissley
Questions for Matthew Sharpe
Jamestown is Matthew Sharpe's fourth book (his previous novel, The Sleeping Father broke out into wide readership, thanks in part to a surprise Today show book club selection). We asked him a few questions about his latest work.
Amazon.com: What attracted you to the Jamestown story (aside, of course, from cashing in on the 400th anniversary)?
Sharpe: For a dozen years I worked as a writer in residence in New York City public schools for a nonprofit called Teachers & Writers Collaborative. In the late '90s a group of middle-school teachers in Queens asked me to help them develop some creative writing exercises for a unit they were about to teach on the Jamestown settlement of 1607 in Virginia. I read John Smith's several accounts of his sojourn there, made up some writing exercises, road-tested them, and liked the material so much I decided to do a big, novel-length writing exercise about it. I was drawn to the extremity of the story, the big personalities--Smith, Pocahontas, Powhatan--and, well, the awfulness of it. The story of Jamestown functions as one of the founding myths of our nation, and I wanted to highlight how America began in violence, bloodshed, and a level of incompetence that would be ridiculous had it not been so deadly; in other words, Jamestown was a lot like the administration of George W. Bush.
As for cashing in, I leave that to lottery winners and poker champions.
Amazon.com: You reveal how the former United States has come to this post-apocalyptic state of affairs in bits and pieces. Did you work that future history out for yourself beforehand, or did you just fill it in on the go, as needed?
Sharpe: I'm inclined to use the term post-annihilation rather than post-apocalyptic, since "apocalypse" implies revelation, i.e., the receiving of some crucial, maybe even divine knowledge. I don't see the people in my novel being the beneficiaries of that kind of knowledge, though some of them are struggling mightily to attain it. And I had a really good model for the post-annihilation future I depict, namely, the pre-annihilation present, presided over by the world's superpower-of-the-moment, us. As for working out my imaginary future beforehand or making it up as I went along: the latter, always the latter. The novel is an improvisation--a structured one, I hope, but the excitement (and terror) of writing fiction for me derives from the way I am always simultaneously playing the game and making up the game.
Amazon.com: How did you choose which elements from the original Jamestown story to include, and which to discard?
Sharpe: Mostly by intuition. I knew I wanted a cross-cultural love story and a cross-cultural horror story to co-exist: this would be the central tension of the novel, each would offset the other, or so I hoped. The primarily economic purpose of the original settlers also seemed important to include. The rest I used or invented as guided by presentiment. And, for better or worse, the things I say in interviews about the novel are mostly retroactive insights--hypotheses more than explanations. The person who wrote the book knows more about it than the person answering these questions does.
Amazon.com: Ben Marcus has written, "My feeling is that the impossible must be made viable, and only through language, that language is not subject to the laws of physics and therefore must not be restricted to conservative notions of 'sense' and 'nonsense,' but must pursue what appears impossible in order to discover the basic things." What's your take on that?
Sharpe: I like what Ben Marcus does with language in his own fiction and in his essays about other peoples'. I'd say one of the ways I tried to use language to depict the impossible in Jamestown was to represent the past, the present, and the future happening simultaneously. This happens at the level of content--people in a future America living one of America's originary historical events as if it had never happened before--and, I hope, it also happens at the level of style--people talking in English that is Shakespearean one moment, Keatsean the next, Otis Reddingesque the next, or all in the same sentence, or word.
Amazon.com: Jamestown is dedicated to Lore Segal, who is known in my house as the author of the fabulous kids' book, Tell Me a Mitzi, but who has had a long and varied career beyond that. What led you to honor her so?
Sharpe: Lore Segal is an excellent human being and was perhaps the most important writing teacher I had. I took a course with her at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan several years after graduating from college. It was all so dicey, "being a writer," it required an audacity I was attempting to muster. Lore's encouragement, her generosity, her good humor, her ability to help me figure out which parts of what I was doing were worth pursuing--these qualities of this wonderful woman helped me muster that audacity. She has a new book out called Shakespeare's Kitchen. Dear readers, if you have not already, please read the short story in there called "The Reverse Bug," and then, when you climb up off the floor, read the rest of the book.
Book Description
Jamestown chronicles a group of “settlers” (more like survivors) from the ravaged island of Manhattan, departing just as the Chrysler Building has mysteriously plummeted to the earth. This ragged band is heading down what’s left of I-95 in a half-school bus, half-Millennium Falcon. Their goal is to establish an outpost in southern Virginia, find oil, and exploit the Indians controlling the area. Based on actual accounts of the Jamestown settlement from 1607 to 1617, Jamestown features historical characters including John Smith, Pocahontas, and others enacting an imaginative re-version of life in the pioneer colony. In this retelling, Pocahontas’s father Powhatan is half-Falstaff, half-Henry V, while his consigliere is a psychiatrist named Sidney Feingold. John Martin gradually loses body parts in a series of violent encounters, and John Smith is a ruthless and pragmatic redhead continually undermining the aristocratic leadership. Communication is by text-messaging, IMing, and, ultimately, telepathy. Punctuated by jokes, rhymes, “rim shot” dialogue, and bloody black-comic tableaux, Jamestown is a trenchant commentary on America's past and present that confirms Matthew Sharpe’s status as a major talent in contemporary fiction.
Customer Reviews:
old weird America.......2007-09-28
Matthew Sharpe's America here is the America of Blood Meridian, a childlike, exuberant, and reflexively violent America. The writing is simultaneously coarse and refined, broad in its obsessions, but cutting and precise in its arch vocabulary. It also keeps its sense of humor all the way through. As absurdist and outlandish as this post-Apocalyptic mashup is, it remains true to the metaphors of the Jamestown settlement. The characters are well-delineated, and it's easy to relate to both the "native" populations and the interlopers as they struggle with cross-cultural communication, one's responsibilities to one's society, and what it's like to fall for a stranger who can scarcely conceive of your roots. John Rolfe's stoned reading of a Rorschach inkblot is a tour de force, moving deftly from the scatological to the heartbreaking, all the while hewing to the novel's own self-made mythos. Sharpe is conscientious about paying off his enigmas, like the red skin of the tribesman, their ability to speak English, and the nature of the war between Manhattan and Brooklyn. He's also good about slipping in historical and cultural nuggets, both ancient and modern. My only issue was with the obvious difficulty of sustaining such an over-the-top narrative. The relentlessness did get to be a little wearing on the backside of the arc.
A Weird and Funny Book.......2007-07-05
Matthew Sharpe's Jamestown takes a story that Americans are at least tangentially familiar with--the disastrous founding of Jamestown in Virginia in 1607--and transforms it into a post-apocalyptic satire. All the familiar names are here Smith, Rolfe, Powhatan and Pocahontas, but now these adventurers and Indians, the survivors of some terrible past doom, find themselves in a blasted brave new world full of violence and uncertainty. This might not sound like the stuff of fall-on-the-floor-laughing comedy, but in Sharpe's hands, it is. Divided into several first-person chapters, Sharpe allows his characters to reveal this re-hashed history in every terrible detail, from the execrable conditions at the colonists' camp to the fatally hilarious encounters between the two groups. It isn't easy to juggle so many characters, but Sharpe does so ably with a mixture of wit, cynicism, and linguistic brio, not seen in letters since Nabokov. The first-person narratives by turns are terrifying, funny, and sad (and usually all of those at once), and it is to Sharpe's credit that even the most repugnant characters are not above our sympathies. Sharpe saves the real lit fireworks, however, for his Pocahontas, who here, is a fast-talking, intelligent, vulnerable, monologist. Trust me when I tell you won't find any "Color of the Wind" fluff, here. (The character's e-mail and instant message exchanges with her sort-of beloved, Johnny Rolfe, are hilarious send ups of e-culture.) She is the funny, cynical, tragic center of this novel and one of many, many reasons why you should pick it up.
Jamestown.......2007-07-01
Gave this one star only because you din't have "0" listed. Don't bother to read. It is disjointed and difficult to follow. I read the author interview and gained some insight...he has a political axe to grind, unfortunatly he must have cut himself on the axe, the book is awful.
Tour de Tour de Force.......2007-06-27
The "Today" show and Anne Tyler's praise first brought my attention to Matthew Sharpe. I bought "The Sleeping Father," his last novel, and was completely floored--a satirical and wry comment on American life that at it heart still has heart, such a rare artistic achievement. So I'll admit, I was predisposed to enjoy whatever came next. Jamestown is more than I could have hoped for. The first thing I love about it--something I love about all great works of literature--is that you have a difficult time describing it. I want to say it's a road book, a little like Cormac McCarthy's "The Road," in that respect. But it's so much more. On the surface, it takes us into the future, at a point when Manhattan and Brooklyn are at war, in the post-apocalyptic ruins of America. A company of men is dispatched to Jamestown, Virginia, where they come in contact with the local tribe of Native Americans, about whom I can say no more without giving too much away. Suffice it to say that in an acid rain world of polluted waters, poisonous air, and species evolution gone wild, the "Indians" seems to have learned how to survive. Jamestown has love stories, war stories, and an underlying analysis of humans in struggles for power. As far as women go, the teenage Pocahontas, diary writing to the world on wireless, is a character that, if I have it right, will go down in literary history: she is a joy to be with, a page-turning treat. The book has so many levels that I don't even know how to communicate them--Sharpe writes sentences that almost comment on themselves but never end up being anything less than lyrical and just beautiful. Jamestown is about America, war, and ultimately about love. It's beautifully crafted and, despite its intellectual and analytical heft that hits you when its all over, it reads like a thriller, each small chapter racing you ahead on the road into that runs simultaneously into the past and the future of America. I'm probably not being clear, so let me say this about it before I wrap up: amazing! I just have one question about the book, and that is: why isn't everyone reading Jamestown? Right now?
It was okay. maybe..........2007-06-02
I realize my title is rather blasé, but I can't garner much enthusiasm for this novel. While I did really like small sections of the book, characters may be more accurate, overall I did not enjoy it. I thought of giving up like a previous reviewer but stuck with it only to be very confused and disappointed. I really like the two main characters and Powhatan, but that's about it.
Average customer rating:
- great for art/"Pocahontas" fans in general
- A book as beautiful as its main character
- Weak parts, but worth taking a look at.
- Very beautiful!
- Miniature Poachontas Book is Big on Color and Information
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ART OF POCAHONTAS, THE
Steven Rebello
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Customer Reviews:
great for art/"Pocahontas" fans in general.......1998-08-24
I love flipping through this book once in a while just to be in awe of Disney animators all over again, but I agree w/ some of the other reviewers who say that there isn't enough about the actual people behind this artwork. I'd like to find out more about how the artists & voices influenced different aspects of the story, reacted to deadlines, etc. too--but the art almost makes up for it. The book also provides some more insight into the personalities of the characters in "Pocahontas," which I found enlightening. Overall, it's a beautiful accompaniment to the movie, and very inspiring as well--makes me want to learn how to draw a little better.
A book as beautiful as its main character.......1997-12-27
The art of Pocahontas is, to my mind, one of the most beautiful books about animation art. Its composition following the making of the film step by step helps the reader to understand how a huge production such as Pocahontas is made and all the production aeras are represented. The pictures taken from the film and the artist's sketches shown in it are so great they could make anyone that did not like the design of Pocahontas ( and god knows they are a lot in France ) loves it. The only thing that could be improved is about photos of the artists in their work environment, there should be more.
Weak parts, but worth taking a look at........1997-11-30
The only thing holding this book together is the easy way it flows. In the tradition of other Disney "Making of..." books, it follows the format of each animation process from concept to script to storyboard to animation. Its interesting, but at times bogs down some nice visuals. Not all the visuals are great, though. The pre-production art seems weak and cliche like the drawings of pilgrims and Indians you remember as a kid. Only in the animation chapters does it pick up, particularly the work of Glen Keane. As chief animator of the title character, his storyboards and animation seem the most inspired and studied. Other character designs seem less bold against Disney's first eco-feminist heroine who paved the way for post-feminist heroines like Esmeralda from Hunchback and Meg from Hercules. The book not unnique in its execution or format, but its worth taking a look at to compare with other films and books and to see the evolution of the thought process of great Disney animators like Keane and Ruben Aquino. And of course it has its share of Disney we-are-doing-this-and-no-one-else-can attitude.
Very beautiful!.......1997-11-26
First of all, I assume that these reviews are supposed to refer to the large hardcover edition, which was published in 1995, and not the smaller 1996 edition. The large one is gorgeous, allowing a look into the world of how the artists develop a film from start to finish. Some of the concept art is so beautiful that you wonder why it didn't make it into the film. My only gripe with this book is that, like Rebello's other books, it deals almost entirely with the visual aspect of the films and, although it talks about how songs developed the movie (the Colors of the Wind section is especially well done), what about the voices? In The Art of Animation: From Mickey Mouse to Beauty and the Beast, descriptions and photos are included of the actors who voiced the characters. While you might say that this sort of thing doesn't belong in an "Art of" book, I think it does, because the actor who voices a character often has a tremendous influence on the visual development of that character. For example, Belle in Beauty and the Beast would not have had the lock of hair that kept falling into her face - an endearing gesture that helped make her more real to the audience - if Paige O'Hara, her voice, had not had it first. The Art of Pocahontas would be perfect if it offered similar insights. But it's definitely worth reading or just looking at, to bask in the sheer beauty of the artwork.
Miniature Poachontas Book is Big on Color and Information.......1997-03-06
Don't let the small size of "The Art of Pocahontas"fool you; the authors have crammed the 5.5" by 4.5" book with loads of colorful artwork and interesting insights into the recent Disney masterpiece.
"The Art of Pocahontas" traces the creation of the film from conception to completion, including wonderful reproductions of concept sketches, background paintings, layout drawings and final animation art. The 189 pages of this small volume contain over 400 color and black-and-white illustrations.
The text was written by Stephen Rebello, an editor of "Movieline" and author of "Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of 'Psycho.'" He provides many insights into the collaborative and creative process behind the making of "Pocahontas."
Even though "The Art of Pocahontas" is an easy read--it takes less than an hour or two to read from cover to cover--the book provides plenty for fans of animation to contemplate. Much of the "behind the scene
Average customer rating:
- The way to write history for children
- Short Biography
- the worst book ever
- WARNING:REALLY BAD BOOK!
- An excellent book
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The Double Life of Pocahontas
Jean Fritz
Manufacturer: Putnam Juvenile
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ASIN: 0698119355 |
Book Description
In a story that is as gripping as it is historical, Jean Fritz reveals the true life of Pocahontas. Though at first permitted to move freely between the Indian and the white worlds, Pocahontas was eventually torn between her new life and the culture that shaped her.
Customer Reviews:
The way to write history for children.......2005-12-05
Jean Fritz is one of the best writers of history for children. She doesn't romanticize or simplify to the point of distortion, and she really puts the story in history. Fritz looks with an intelligent and sensitive eye into the heart and mind of Pocahontas, and with an unflinching and respectful eye to Native Americans and the English. The Pilgrim's landing on Plymouth Rock gets more attention, but it all started at Jamestown and this book is an excellent introduction.
Short Biography.......2003-06-24
This is a short, less than 100 pages, biography of what is know about Pocahontas. I rated it 5 stars although I would have preferred a longer book. However the book is priced right for it's size.
From what I can determine, the book is historically accurate. If your purpose for reading the book is to learn the basics about the life of Pocahontas, then I highly recommend it. If, however, you just wish to be entertained, watch the Disney movie. The movie is not even close to being historically accurate, but it is entertaining.
the worst book ever.......2002-03-11
You should NOT buy the Double life of Pochahontas.There is barely any dialog. It's really d u l l. Its about the english at Jamestown.It is more of a text book than a story book. It is barley about pochahontas at all. It all starts when the English build Jamestown...
WARNING:REALLY BAD BOOK!.......2002-03-11
I think this book was one of the worst books in the whole world! This book sounded like a rough draft. It just stated facts and it had no dialogue. It was not entertaining at all.
An excellent book.......2000-10-20
The Double Life of Pocahontas is, I think, a very interesting book for those who like Indians,wars,and mixed emotion stories. I recommendthis book for people ages 10 and up. I do this because I think anyone under ten might not understand some of the parts of the book. This book as you might of guessed is about Pocahontas and her life. It starts right before the settlers come. Along the way you'll learn some interesting facts about the Indians and the settlers. First Pocahontas saves John Smith from being killed. He's adopted into the tribe. Then John Smith goes back to London. Things then start to fall apart. The Indians attacked the settlers and the colony falls apart. Pocahontas is then captured and is being converted into Christian. Her father never trys to save her. She marries and is taken to England to met the King and Queen. She wants to stay in England. I won't tell you what happens you'll have to find out for yourself. The author,Jean Fritz,did very good research on this book. If I could I would read it again. This book is great read it now!
Book Description
Four centuries ago, and fourteen years before the Mayflower, a group of men—led by a one-armed ex-pirate, an epileptic aristocrat, a reprobate cleric and a government spy—left London aboard a fleet of three ships to start a new life in America. They arrived in Virginia in the spring of 1607 and set about trying to create a settlement on a tiny island in the James River. Despite their shortcomings, and against the odds, they built Jamestown, a ramshackle outpost that laid the foundations of the British Empire and the United States of America.
Drawing on new discoveries, neglected sources and manuscript collections scattered across the world, Savage Kingdom challenges the textbook image of Jamestown as a mere money-making venture. It reveals a reckless, daring enterprise led by outcasts of the Old World who found themselves interlopers in a new one. It charts their journey into a beautiful landscape and a sophisticated culture that they found both ravishing and alien, which they yearned to possess but threatened to destroy. They called their new home a "savage kingdom," but it was the savagery they had experienced in Europe that had driven them across the ocean and which they hoped to escape by building in America "one of the most glorious nations under the sun."
An intimate story in an epic setting, Woolley shows how the land of Pocahontas came to be drawn into a new global order, reaching from London to the Orinoco Delta, from the warring kingdoms of Angola to the slave markets of Mexico, from the gates of the Ottoman Empire to the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Customer Reviews:
Great stories about our first steps..........2007-08-12
I came across this book after hearing the author interviewed on NPR on the anniversary of the Jamestown colony. From just the few minutes I managed to catch from that conversation the author had me rethinking my vague and mostly uninvestigated thoughts on that early settlement.
Wooley has a great ability to take well researched and documented accounts and weave a compelling narrative without overly indulging in fantasy or sketches compiled of heresay or assumptions.
What took me in about this book was just how much Byzantine politics and motives the early administrators of the colony had coming over from England. (i.e aliases, spies, traitors, defectors, etc.)
If you are interested in what the first steps were in The New World before Declarations and Revolutions and why they were made, I would check this out. It's an essential foundation if you are, like me, consuming our countries earliest intentions and ambitions that led us to where we are now.
Good book, with good and sometimes distracting details.......2007-08-02
With the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first colonists and founding of the first permanent British settlement in present day America, there have been a slew of books and reexaminations of the settlement. Wooley, a popular writer and broadcaster in Great Britain has contributed to this review of the Jamestown by presenting a popular history from the British viewpoint, that examines the founding of Jamestown from the perspective that tries to place Jamestown in the perspective of the new House of Stuart monarchy, a Britain with a shaken economy, and the race to make a claim in North America to compete with the Spanish Empire. Along the way, the Powhatan native tribe Chesapeake Bay have their motivations and civilization examined as this strongest of the east coast tribes.
The strongest parts of this book involve the examination of the relationship between the first settlers and the Powhatan Indians, the exploration of the Chesapeake for the first time by Europeans by Captain John Smith and why Jamestown was so important to the British government. The relationship between the founding of Virginia and the discovery of Bermuda, and why, for a time the Bermuda part of the Virginia colony was much more important economically to Britain is a nice find within a book, and Wooley does his best work of showing human drama with Bermuda.
The book is weak by dragging details of the British government out many pages past necessary for the popular reader, especially the American reader who, from the standpoint of 400 years of time will take some effort to dig into the bureaucracy of the that government for a popular history read.
If the general reader is willing to go through the 400 pages of details, at the end, he should find a great explanation for the place of Jamestown in the American, Indian and British story. The book hits its high point with its description of the first Jamestown Assembly, the first such representative government in modern times that was founded as much out of corporate business interests and a leveling out of previous British hierarchies in the American jungle.
For a popular history, Savage Kingdom shows why the British way of colonization - joint stock companies, authorized but not led by the government with a grass roots organization of the Christian church succeeded in the long run over the government/ military colonization of Latin America.
This is a fine book, but again, the general reader should be warned that it has heavy details of the details of British government among personalities that are often hard to follow.
Book Description
The True Story of Pocahontas: The Other Side of History incorporates the sacred oral history of the Mattaponi that has been passed down to Lin "Little Bear" since his childhood, by his father, the late Mattaponi Chief Webster "Little Eagle" Custalow; his uncle, the late Mattaponi Chief O. T. Custalow; and grandfather, the late Mattaponi Chief George F. Custalow; and those that came before. The Mattaponi Indian tribe, along with the Pamunkey tribe, was one of the original core tribes of the Powhatan Chiefdom, which the English colonists encountered in the 17th century while establishing Jamestown. For nearly 400 years people have heard the Euro-American rendition and interpretation of events that transpired between the English colonists and the Powhatan Indians. The True Story of Pocahontas is the first public publication of the Powhatan perspective that has been maintained and passed down from generation to generation within the Mattaponi Tribe, and the first written history of Pocahontas by her own people. The True Story of Pocahontas will be published in 2007, in connection with the 400th anniversary of the founding of the Jamestown Colony.
Customer Reviews:
A book everyone should read.......2007-07-18
The authors of this book felt that this was the time to finally tell the true story of Pocahontas, and I completely agree. It's time people, especially Americans, face the truth that has been shrouded in romantic myth for far too long. It may be difficult for some to think of such historical figures as John Smith, John Rolfe and others to be anything but heroes, but it's far more important to the history of this country that the truth be told. The Mattaponi, Pocahontas's tribe, has kept their secret knowledge of the truth to themselves for 400 years. It is with bravery and no doubt a sense of relief that they finally decided to share it with the world. The time for Disney movies and romaticized stories is over: it is now time for the truth.
A Must-Read for 2007.......2007-04-12
This is a very important story that should be read by as many people as possible. It is essential that we recognize the value of oral history--and the other side of history that is presented here. We generally know so little about the native people who interacted with the English settlers of Jamestown--their beliefs, their way of life, and their perspective. We are very fortunate that Dr. Custalow was willing to share the story that he knows with the rest of us, particularly as we turn our attention to Jamestown during this "celebration" year. It is beautifully and evocatively written and well worth your time and thought. I know that reading it has affected me, and increased my understanding of this pivotal time in our nation's history. Thank you for your contribution, Dr. Custalow.
Review of The True Story of Pocahontas.......2007-04-11
After reading this version of Pocahontas, a lot of things became clearer to me. I could never understand how, when the Natives from the rest of the United States were treated so horribly by the Anglos, that the Natives of Virginia escaped, virtually unscathed, during the time of Powhatan. It was very informative, beautifully written and I am grateful that the truth has been told. My congratulations go out to both Linwood Custalow and Angie Daniels for writing this book. I know that Chief Webster 'Little Eagle' Custalow, from his present vantage point, is very proud of this contribution to history. I only wish that he were here, in person, to tell you this.
Thank you for sharing,
Barbara 'Little Doe' Adkins
Gloucester, Virginia
The True Story of Pocahontas: The Other Side of History.......2007-03-14
The book tells a "new" story to me from the standpoint of the Powhatan Indians of Virginia. I enjoyed learning of Pocahontas from the viewpoint of her ancestors. This oral history of her life was enlightening. It made me rethink how my English ancestors behaved and how they may not have been as truthful and honest to a trusting Powhatan Indian Chief, Pocahontas's father, to gain successful knowledge about planting and growing crops in the "New World." I also never knew that Pocahontas might have been kidnapped by the settlers. To learn in this book that Pocahontas may have been poisoned in England, where she died, it was very sad.
Great read!
Thanks to Dr. Custalow.
Average customer rating:
- Nicely paced read...I learned a lot and enjoyed it
- Timely read! Made me want to visit Jamestown again!
- What a great read, please tell us more of Smith's earlier story
- Good, readable popular history, but with a doozy of a mistake
- Engaging
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Love and Hate in Jamestown: John Smith, Pocahontas, and the Start of a New Nation
David A. Price
Manufacturer: Vintage
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Binding: Paperback
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Land As God Made It: Jamestown And the Birth of America
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Jamestown, the Buried Truth
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Pocahontas, Powhatan, Opechancanough: Three Indian Lives Changed by Jamestown
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Captain John Smith: Jamestown and the Birth of the American Dream
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The Jamestown Adventure: Accounts of the Virginia Colony, 1605-1614 (Real Voices, Real History)
ASIN: 1400031729
Release Date: 2005-01-04 |
Book Description
A New York Times Notable Book and a
San Jose Mercury News Top 20 Nonfiction Book of 2003
In 1606, approximately 105 British colonists sailed to America, seeking gold and a trade route to the Pacific. Instead, they found disease, hunger, and hostile natives. Ill prepared for such hardship, the men responded with incompetence and infighting; only the leadership of Captain John Smith averted doom for the first permanent English settlement in the New World.
The Jamestown colony is one of the great survival stories of American history, and this book brings it fully to life for the first time. Drawing on extensive original documents, David A. Price paints intimate portraits of the major figures from the formidable monarch Chief Powhatan, to the resourceful but unpopular leader John Smith, to the spirited Pocahontas, who twice saved Smith’s life. He also gives a rare balanced view of relations between the settlers and the natives and debunks popular myths about the colony. This is a superb work of history, reminding us of the horrors and heroism that marked the dawning of our nation.
Customer Reviews:
Nicely paced read...I learned a lot and enjoyed it.......2007-07-10
I really enjoyed this work and enjoyed its pacing and the way the author weaved the historical narrative with the characters and the sense of timeline. A great overview of the period and I would recommend this one. A well balanced book to help the reader understand the period and how things were viewed. In fact I was anxious to see if I could get other books by this author!
Timely read! Made me want to visit Jamestown again!.......2007-05-07
Easy read. Couldn't imagine how I missed some of these details in US History, but nonetheless so glad I picked it up - could not put it down.
What a great read, please tell us more of Smith's earlier story.......2007-04-12
Love and Hate in Jamestown is a very enjoyable and very readable antidote to the usual Pocahontas nonsense cooked up by disney and more recently presented in the new world. Chock full of well researched facts and anecdotes about this remarkable chapter in America's history. Price's accounts about John Smith's life before he came to Virginia sounds at least as fascinating as what he achieved once he was in Virginia. He stands as one of the archetypes of the early Americans, combining all of those qualities good and bad, which have ultimately defined us as a people.
Good, readable popular history, but with a doozy of a mistake.......2007-04-05
Smoothly written and, for the most part, well edited, this is probably a fine introduction to the history of the Virginia colony in the early 17th century.
There are two flaws, one minor and one major. First, the author (or, more likely, the editors) sometimes dumbs down too much (e.g., he takes a paragraph to explain what "trade winds" are, and defines "longitude"--readers would either know about these already or have a dictionary at hand). Second, the book's one map of eastern Virginia has an inexcusable error: Jamestown is shown to be in the area of modern-day Fort Eustis, about 10 miles east of where it really was! This is equivalent to publishing an account of the New Netherlands with a map showing New Amsterdam in the Bronx, or one of the New England Puritans that has them siting Boston where Newton is. I hope this was noticed and fixed for the paperback and other editions.
Engaging.......2007-01-20
I really enjoyed reading this book. I found myself anxious to get home to read it every night. Price was very informative and his writing flowed nicely. My wife and I look forward to our trip to Jamestown for the 400th anniversary.
Average customer rating:
- mikey52791
- Wonderful, full of facts and life
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Pocahontas
Edgar Parin D'aulaire
Manufacturer: Beautiful Feet Bks
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Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0964380366 |
Product Description
First published in 1946 with the d'Aulaires's beautiful lithographic prints, this tale of the first colony at Jamestown is told from the perspective of the princess daughter of the mighty chief Powhatan. When the Natives judge the white man's magic as evil, John Smith is condemned to death—only the intervention of Pocahontas saves his life and a tentative friendship is established between Pocahontas's tribe and the new colonists. The King of England sends a crown, rich robes and a royal bed to honor Powhatan and he is pleased, but the white man's insistence that the Indians give them corn to sustain them through the long winters threatens their tenuous relationship. Pocahontas's ultimate marriage to John Rolfe, the birth of their son, their voyage to England and presentation to the King and Queen is the stuff of fairy tales except that it is one of the great true stories of America's earliest days. 46pg
Customer Reviews:
mikey52791.......2005-12-16
I think this was an okay book for kids. It was funny when the animals played around and it was sad when the indians took john smith away.
Wonderful, full of facts and life.......2000-04-05
We've been taking this book out the library for years. We finally bought it. As with all of the books by Ingri and Edgar Parin d'aulaire, the illustrations are beautiful, the stories full of information and the facts true. They are very easy to read but still not wishy-washy. We all learn something everytime we read them. You want to read them over and over. Our children read these for fun. Wonderful.
Book Description
Pocahontas may be the most famous Native American who ever lived, but during the settlement of Jamestown, and for two centuries afterward, the great chiefs Powhatan and Opechancanough were the subjects of considerably more interest and historical documentation than the young woman. It was Opechancanough who captured the foreign captain "Chawnzmit" -- John Smith. Smith gave Opechancanough a compass, described to him a spherical earth that revolved around the sun, and wondered if his captor was a cannibal. Opechancanough, who was no cannibal and knew the world was flat, presented Smith to his elder brother, the paramount chief Powhatan. The chief, who took the name of his tribe as his throne name (his personal name was Wahunsenacawh), negotiated with Smith over a lavish feast and opened the town to him, leading Smith to meet, among others, Powhatan's daughter Pocahontas. Thinking he had made an ally, the chief finally released Smith. Within a few decades, and against their will, his people would be subjects of the British Crown.
Despite their roles as senior politicians in these watershed events, no biography of either Powhatan or Opechancanough exists. And while there are other "biographies" of Pocahontas, they have for the most part elaborated on her legend more than they have addressed the known facts of her remarkable life. As the 400th anniversary of Jamestown's founding approaches, nationally renowned scholar of Native Americans, Helen Rountree, provides in a single book the definitive biographies of these three important figures. In their lives we see the whole arc of Indian experience with the English settlers -- from the wary initial encounters presided over by Powhatan, to the uneasy diplomacy characterized by the marriage of Pocahontas and John Rolfe, to the warfare and eventual loss of native sovereignty that came during Opechancanough's reign.
Writing from an ethnohistorical perspective that looks as much to anthropology as the written records, Rountree draws a rich portrait of Powhatan life in which the land and the seasons governed life and the English were seen not as heroes but as Tassantassas (strangers), as invaders, even as squatters. The Powhatans were a nonliterate people, so we have had to rely until now on the white settlers for our conceptions of the Jamestown experiment. This important book at last reconstructs the other side of the story.
Customer Reviews:
The True Story Of Pocahontas, John Smith and Chief Powhatan.......2005-11-22
Everyone is familiar with the story of Pocahontas and British explorer/adventurer John Smith. They are romantic stories fed to us by the likes of Disney (10 yrs ago in the 1995 film) and countless romanticized versions in historical fiction novels. This "documentary" book exposes the truth about what really happened in the span of time that John Smith, Jon Rolfe and the Virginia Company founded Jamestown and dealt with the Indian tribes headed by Chief Powhatan and his brother Openchancanough. Since Thanksgiving is fast approaching, this makes a fine book to read if you are interested in the earliest British colonial period of the 1600's, when the pilgrims fist arrived in the Eastern coast of the United States. This period has been romanticized by movies and novels, evoking a thrilling time of danger, intrigue and romance, when Indians and colonists sparred and sometimes made peace, even made love. Princess Pocahontas was the daughter of Chief Powhatan. She was only fifteen or so when she first met Jon Smith and a romance was highly unlikely, even if perhaps the girl felt an attraction to the supposedly attractive adventurer. John Smith had traveled across the globe to foreign lands as a British explorer and was in his day a bad boy. That he may have gotten into trouble with Chief Powhatan and his people is probably true. Pocahontas was a diplomat, a healer/medicine woman and regarded as a peacemaker. Even if she didn't do a dramatic a thing as offer herself up as sacrifice to save John Smith's life, she did for a time lessen tension between the natives and the colonists. She married Jon Rolfe, a British nobleman, was converted to Christianity, learned to read and speak English. She journeyed across the Atlantic, leaving behind her old life in the tribe and became a popular figure in London society. She became a lady. Most people forget about this phase in her life and it must have been a very interesting story within itself. Did she miss her old life ? Was she as respected in London or did she experience a form of racism because she was not a white English lady ? Powhatan's life is documented well in this book. He was a very influential man in his time and he, too, was able to negotiate with the English. Jamestown brought these people together. They hoped that Jamestown would be an independent, Utopian society where English and natives could live and prosper. Unfortunately, Jamestown succumbed to disease and death. The dream died and conflict between natives and colonists resumed. If you're a big history buff, this book is for you.
Pieces of the Real Jamestown and its Major Players.......2005-08-08
The major theme of POCAHONTAS POWHATAN OPECHANCANOUGH: THREE INDIAN LIVES CHANGED BY JAMESTOWN revolves around truth. For each story that has been told about Virginia's Jamestown settlement or Pocahontas in general, its has centered on the Captain John Smith and Pocahontas legend and myth that has been overly romanticized in novels and in movies. At this time, no scholar has made the attempt to intertwine the Indian voice within the English story of Jamestown. However, Helen Rountree attempts to provide the Native American voice, but from letters and accounts by English colonists and foreigners. It is unfortunate that the Indians did not record their accounts of the arrival of these new world settlers, or as Rountree suggests, invaders. Nonetheless, Rountree places the three major participants' semi-biographical accounts at the forefront of this study in order to incorporate their contribution to the settlement as well as the invasion of white colonists to the Indian landscape.
Rountree examines these three major actors and their way of life from anthropological perspective. Indeed, this is an historical narrative that deals with ethnohistory, but one that is " about one side only" (p. 6). Historians study their subject matters in order to get to the bottom of how an event occurred and its end result - think in terms of the past while writing in the present. Rountree takes the same approach, and studied the Powhatan side with why and how they acted the way they did. Rountree is critical and frank about past accounts of the Jamestown story as told by historian, William Strachey, HISTORIE OF TRAVELL INTO VIRGINIA BRITANIA and his plagiarized version of John Smith's narrative, GENERALL HISTORIE, which takes an English perspective that downplays the Indian presence. Rountree clarifies misconceptions that have been told within past narratives.
Chronologically, the book covers the period from 1607 to 1644. With these periods, one has a time frame to work with. Rountree provides an in depth analysis of the inception and deterioration of relations between natives and colonists of the Virginia Company's settlement in Jamestown and the wars that concurred in 1622 and 1644. The book shows how life was like before the colonists, and the significance of Powhatan daily rituals. Rountree's expertise in so-called "digging deep" to the root of origins from an anthropological point of view allows the reader to understand how life was simple and structured for the Powhatans. Rountree suggests that life only later became complicated when the Indians had to provide and teach the colonists how to survive. In the process, both Indians and colonists discovered that their lifestyles and environments were different than what they had been accustomed to.
For the sake of understanding, POCAHONTAS POWHATAN OPECHANCANOUGH will allow readers of history to see the bigger picture of the Jamestown story that took place three centuries ago. Although this history has already passed, its legacy and myths continues to engage readers. Helen Rountree should be commended for taken the task to reveal the real Pocahontas as human as possible and not as a Disney cutout, and to emphasize the predominant role of chief leader, Powhatan, and his successor or "brother", Opechancanough as essential actors in American history.
Review.......2005-08-03
Most interesting. A story of the founding of Jamestown from the Indian point of view. It is a family tradition that we are descended from Powhatan, and the story meant a great deal to me.
Average customer rating:
- Definitely fiction
- Pocohantas: We Wish There Was a Sequel
- A really, really, really good book - A Kid Review
- Fabulous Book!!
- I loved this book!
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Pocahontas and the Strangers (Scholastic Biography)
Clyde Robert Bulla
Manufacturer: Scholastic Paperbacks
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ASIN: 0590434810 |
Customer Reviews:
Definitely fiction.......2007-02-08
This was the only book on our (homeschool) reading list about Pocahontas but we simply couldn't get past Chapter 4 (though I read the rest myself). My son usually begs me to read more, but with this book he begged me to stop reading altogether.
The historical inaccuracies are blatant and the book isn't even well-written. If you do read it, do so knowing that it is out and out fiction and nothing else. Better yet, watch the Disney movie. It's almost as historically accurate and much more enjoyable.
Pocohantas: We Wish There Was a Sequel.......2005-10-10
This is the third time we are reading this book...in a row! My 8 year-old devoured it; I couldn't put it down; now my 6 year old is reading a chapter or two aloud to my 5 year old each time we drive in the car.
Bulla does a tremendous job spinning a tale out of the few historical facts we know of Pocohantas. This story explores the feelings of Pocohantas (the book is somewhat told from her perspective) from her curiosity in the beginning over whether or not white men really exist to the very real dangers she faces and the disappointments she experiences. The story races from one dramatic conflict to the next: espionage, self-sacrifice, kidnapping, war, love, family ties, cultural differences, trust and friendship: it's all here.
Even non-motivated readers will be so caught up in the excitement they unknowingly will learn some history along the way!
A really, really, really good book - A Kid Review.......2004-12-15
I really liked Pocahontas and the Strangers because she saved the bald eagle and Captain John Smith. Too bad that Pocahontas died because she didn't get to go back home. I liked this book better than the movie.
Fabulous Book!!.......2004-10-01
My daughter couldn't put it down and that's in itself is a miracle. She has not been a big reader but that changed when reading this book!
I loved this book!.......2003-12-04
This was a great book. It was full of action. For example, when Powhatan gets angry with John Smith for stealing food for the colonists, the author really creates a sense of danger and imminent war. Pocahontas is a great character and is portrayed as a kind person. I reccommend this book to people who enjoy historical fiction.
Book Description
Camilla Townsend's stunning book differs from all previous biographies of Pocahontas in capturing how similar seventeenth-century Native Americans were--in the way they saw, understood, and struggled to control their world--not only to the invading English but to ourselves.
Neither naïve nor innocent, Indians like Pocahontas and her father, the powerful king Powhatan, confronted the vast might of the English with sophistication, diplomacy, and violence. Indeed, Pocahontas's life is a testament to the subtle intelligence that Native Americans, always aware of their material disadvantages, brought against the military power of the colonizing English. Resistance, espionage, collaboration, deception: Pocahontas's life is shown as a road map to Native American strategies of defiance exercised in the face of overwhelming odds and in the hope for a semblance of independence worth the name.
Customer Reviews:
Not the worst biography of Pocahontas, but..........2007-09-29
A brief history of Jamestown and a very sketchy and alomst contentless discussion of Powhatan and the Powhatan Confederacy from the "perspective" (scare quotes intentional) of Pocahontas.
I learned a couple of new facts from this but on the whole I can't reccomed this book. The author tries to get in the head of the legendary Indian Princess but the authors very poitically correct assumptions of what Pocahontas would feel are far from convincing, interestingly enough I had never previously believed in the John Smith-Pocahontas love story at all until I read this, but her disavowal of it was so unconvincing I am now not nearly so sure... The same can be said of several of her other psychological insights which have a very shallow basis, that seem to reflect the author's own feelings without any appearance of critical reflection.
On the positive side it is nice to see such a sympathetic view of John Rolfe, who the author seems quite taken with, but by this point I was rather weary of the whole thing. Luckily it was very short, and even though I actually spent a fair amount of time checking endnotes and even checking a couple of sources, reading the book took only a few hours. I bought it at lunch and went out to dinner that night having finished it.
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