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American Literature
The authors Cotton Mather, John Smith, and Mary Rowlandson had various opinions regarding the Indians. Cotton Mather was known to be a puritan, historian, as well as a preacher. He had an extremely close relationship with the Native Indians to the point whereby, he even mastered their language. He seemed to believe that the Indians were people who had noble intentions. Furthermore, he often criticized the Quakers as they had a negative attitude towards the Indians (Fagan, 2005.34). Also, Captain John Smith had a positive attitude towards the Indians from Powhatan. The paramount chief of the Powhatan Indians formed an alliance with Smith. It was for the purpose of ensuring that English colonies flourished. Unfortunately, Indians became hostile towards other English settlers after Smith left. Smith was quite open minded and often referred to the Indians as being civil. In fact, Smith treated the Indians and English as being equals (Fagan, 2005.48).On the other hand, Mary Rowlandson has a negative attitude towards the Indians. She believes that they were evil as they committed many heinous deeds. For example, the Indians burned people’s houses and murdered innocent children (Fagan, 2005.56).
In my opinion, the author who gave the best description of the Indians was John Smith. He claimed that the native Indians were people who had been misunderstood. They were often treated unfairly by the Europeans, who were only interested in taking their resources. Moreover, the Indians from Powhatan had proven that they could be civil if they were treated well. This means that if the Indians were approached in a negative manner, they would also retaliate by being bad. The true description of Indians is thus provided by John Smith who let them be known in a positive way.
Work Cited
Fagan, Brian. Ancient North America: The Archaeology of a Continent 4th Ed. New York. Thames & Hudson Inc, 2005.Print.
