King James I Character Analysis

The mythical Pocahontas who loved John Smith, the English, the Christian faith, and London more than she loved her own father or people or faith or village deeply appealed to the settlers of James­town and the court of King James. That Pocahontas also inspired the romantic poets and patriotic myth-makers of the nineteenth century, as well as many twentieth-century producers of toys, films, and books. With one accord, all these storytellers subverted her life to satisfy their own need to believe that the Indians loved and admired them (or their cultural forebears) without resentments, without guile. She deserves better.

The mythical Pocahontas who loved John Smith, the English, the Christian faith, and London more than she loved her own father or people or faith or village deeply appealed to the settlers of James­town and the court of King James. That Pocahontas also inspired the romantic poets and patriotic myth-makers of the nineteenth century, as well as many twentieth-century producers of toys, films, and books. With one accord, all these storytellers subverted her life to satisfy their own need to believe that the Indians loved and admired them (or their cultural forebears) without resentments, without guile. She deserves better.