John Smith

The two John Smith pieces we read for class had a similar purpose. In class we decided that this purpose was to convince others to come and populate America. The only problem I have with this is that personally if i was in Europe and heard the "The Generall Historie of Virginia" I would not want to come to America. I do not think that coming to a new land and getting captured and almost killed by natives would be very fun or exciting. However, I do know some people who would, so I suppose this is a valid conclusion of the purpose of the two pieces. I also agree that this is valid for the first story "A Description of New England." This piece uses a great deal of exaggeration to instill hope or almost certain success in those who may come to America.

I think that it was a really good idea for John Smith to use third person narrative in "The Generall Historie of Virginia." Had he not done this, the story would not have been nearly as successful as it has been. I would not enjoy reading a story where a guy is telling how great he is and how much of a hero he should be considered (that is too cocky!). By making himself a character in the story, it was much more effective, and people are much less likely to become repulsed by the character and the story.

I thought it was really interesting that the titles did not match up with the writings. The first piece, "A Description of New England" was spelled "correctly," while the entire story was not. However, "The Generall Historie of Virginia" is not spelled "correctly," but the rest of the story is. I thought this was really interesting. I have no idea why this would be, but it was just something that made me curious.