Monthly Archives: September 2014

Bradford and Morton

How would you compare Bradford’s first sight of the continent with other first sightings we have seen, for example, in the accounts of Columbus and Vespucci?  What do the differences among them suggest about the viewers and their purposes in the Americas?  In the absence of cannibals and amazons, what are the primary symbolic and literal threats to Bradford’s colony and how do they change over time?

Columbus, Vespucci, and the New World

In many ways, Vespucci’s portrayal of the new world sounds like Columbus’s, even though they are writing about regions nowhere near each other. What sorts of conventions for representing the new world can we see repeated in these two letters? Why is it important that they are so similar? Are they different in any important ways?