Becoming Strangers:

Travel, Trust, and the Everyday.

Day Nine: “Up and Down the Wilderness.”

Travel Narratives

Our very oldest stories concern creation, war, and travel.

Creation stories explain “how it is,” and why.

War and travel stories are about imbalance, when things aren’t like they “should be.”

Homer’s Odyssey

Oral epic written down in 8th or 7th century BCE.

“Periplum”—Originally, a map of the coastline made as you travel. By extension any map made as you travel.

Exodus of the Israelites

Moses leads the Israelites out of Egyptian slavery, ca. 13th century BCE. They spend “40 years” (aka a looong time) in “the wilderness” on way.

Retold in first five books of the Jewish & Christian scriptures.

Along way, they cross the “Sea of Reeds” (traditionally confused with the Red Sea) & have many other adventures.

Mary Rowlandson’s “True History” (1682)

International bestseller.

Most famous example of the “Indian captivity narrative.”

First and only work by its author.

Retells 11 weeks, 5 days that a minister’s wife spends among the Wampanoag people.

Background: King Philip’s War (1675-76)

Early English settlement in Massachusetts area aided by Wampanoags under Massasoit.

From 1640s to 70s new settlers pour into Mass., Conn., and RI region. By 1660s they are self-sufficient.

Massasoit dies 1661; “King Philip” (Metacom) becomes leader of Wampanoags & creates a coalition to resist the English.

In 1675 Philip puts an informer to death; the English retaliate & kill three. War breaks out.

600 English & 3,000 Indians die by war’s end, brought about by widespread starvation among Indians & Philip’s death.

Plot of Rowlandson’s Narrative

Lose home.Lose family.

Dwell in WILDERNESS.

Regain family.Regain home.

Or, to Use Images We’ve Already Seen:

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More About that Middle Term: The Wilderness

• “Wilderness” does not equal “no people.”

• “Wilderness” equals being unsure of one’s “place.”

• The response? Reassert one’s old sense of “place” (family, social standing, religion, Bible).

• Learn the new “place” (social order, cuisine, language).

• Improvise “spaces” that you can inhabit.

• While “unhoused,” you are especially receptive to the vividness & distinctiveness of particulars.

“Seeing what she doesn’t see, saying what she doesn’t say.”

Once back from the “wilderness” and feeling at “home,” Rowlandson describes her adventures using the values, language, and assumptions appropriate to her “place.” Yet, almost despite herself, she shows us the following:

– The Wampanoags are remarkably generous to her, despite their desperate circumstances.

– The Wampanoags are far from immoral.

– Rowlandson is remarkably succesful in creating “space” for herself (sewing!); she is no passive victim.

– The English have been downright stupid in how they’ve handled the situation.

The Middle World

Term from Shakespearean criticism.

Describes the “between” zone & time in which one is “unhoused” & “out of place.”

The Middle World is dangerous but also creative: new spaces can be generated that might lead to new “places” that enable new modes of living.

Travel stories are ways of sharing and / or controlling the unpredictable consequences of movement into “Middle Worlds” such as Mary Rowlandson’s “wilderness.”