Voyages in Print English Narratives of Travel to America 1576}}}1624 [Hardcover]

A re-reading of American colonial voyage narratives and their reception since the Victorian era.In the decades leading up to England's first permanent American colony, the literature which emerged needed to establish certain realities against a background of scepticism, and it also had to find ways of theorizing the enterprise. The voyage narratives evolved almost from the outset as a genre concerned with recuperating failure SH as noble, strategic, even as a form of success. Reception of these texts since the Victorian era has often accepted their claims of heroism and mastery; this study argues for a more complicated, less glorious history.In the decades leading up to England's first permanent American colony, the literature which emerged needed to establish certain realities against a background of scepticism, and it also had to find ways of theorizing the enterprise. The voyage narratives evolved almost from the outset as a genre concerned with recuperating failure SH as noble, strategic, even as a form of success. Reception of these texts since the Victorian era has often accepted their claims of heroism and mastery; this study argues for a more complicated, less glorious history.In the decades leading up to England's first permanent American colony, the literature that emerged needed to establish certain realities against a background of skepticism, and it also had to find ways of theorizing the enterprise. The voyage narratives evolved almost from the outset as a genre concerned with recuperating failure--as noble, strategic, even as a form of success. Reception of these texts since the Victorian era has often accepted their claims of heroism and mastery; this study argues for a more complicated, less glorious history.List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Early ventures: writing under the Gilbert and Ralegh patents; 2. Ralegh's discoveries: the two voyages to Guiana; 3. Mastering words: the Jamestown colonists and John Smith; 4. The 'greatlÃ%