- Paperback: 448 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Classics; Reprint edition (Nov 16 1998)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0140436766
- ISBN-13: 978-0140436761
- Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 13 x 2.2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 318 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #866,682 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
"A splendid conceived edition of Sedgwick's historical romance." -- Choice
"Develops the connections between patriarchal authority within the Puritan State and its policy of dispossessing and exterminating Indians...." -- Legacy
"makes available after many decades the New Englander's tale of seventeenth-century Puritans and their relations with the indigenous Indian population." -- Nineteenth-Century Literature --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
"Develops the connections between patriarchal authority within the Puritan State and its policy of dispossessing and exterminating Indians...." -- Legacy
"makes available after many decades the New Englander's tale of seventeenth-century Puritans and their relations with the indigenous Indian population." -- Nineteenth-Century Literature --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
Book Description
Set in seventeenth-century New England, Hope Leslie (1827) is a rich, fast-paced frontier romance, complete with bloody massacres, daring prison escapes, and alliances that violate the strictures of both white and Indian societies. A counterpoint to the novels of James Fenimore Cooper, it is also a revolutionary portrait of early American life, one that challenges the conventional view of Indians, tackles interracial marriage and cross-cultural friendship, and, most strikingly, claims for women their rightful place in our nation's history.
At the center of the novel are two friends whose actions and attitudes illustrate female strengths and values. Hope Leslie, a spirited thinker in a repressive Puritan society, fights for justice for the Indians and asserts the equality of the sexes by defying the patriarchs and choosing her own husband. Magawisca, the daughter of a Pequot chief, braves her father's wrath to save a white man and risks her freedom to reunite Hope with her sister, who as a child was captured by the Pequots and has chosen to remain with them.
The American ideal of giving everyone a voice is reflected in the very form of the novel. Letters throughout the book reveal the opinions of various characters, and the nonliterate Magawisca articulates her point of view in an impassioned speech before a Puritan tribunal. Their voices address still unresolved questions about the place of women, of Native Americans, and of dissenters of all kinds, in an American utopia.
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First Sentence
William Fletcher was the son of a respectable country gentleman of Suffolk, in England; and the destined heir of his uncle Sir William Fletcher, an eminent lawyer, who had employed his talents with such effective zeal and pliant principle, that he had won his way to courtly favour and secured a courtly fortune. Read the first page
Front Cover | Table of Contents | Excerpt
William Fletcher was the son of a respectable country gentleman of Suffolk, in England; and the destined heir of his uncle Sir William Fletcher, an eminent lawyer, who had employed his talents with such effective zeal and pliant principle, that he had won his way to courtly favour and secured a courtly fortune. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
a wonderful glimpse in the past of our country,
By Maddalena "la_maddalena" (United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Hope Leslie: or, Early Times in the Massachusetts (Paperback)
Sedgewick wrote this book almost 200 years ago. It was hard to read this book without comparing just about everything.I compared her vocabulary, her descriptions of indians vs the british, the descriptions of appropriate behavior, the mores of the puritans. Particularly delightful was the way she portrayed Native Americans speaking in old english "thither he went" "thy hands" I have read other books from this era, and normally they have a terrible ending, so we can all mourn the (dead) heroine. This book had some skillful twists and turns. Surely as some of our less sophisticated readers have remarked, the plot was rather romantic and maybe even foppish, but consider the era in which it was read. it is a valuable window to the past. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good read
1.0 out of 5 stars
The worst book written,
By A Customer
This review is from: Hope Leslie: or, Early Times in the Massachusetts (Paperback)
This is possibly the worst book written all time. Why is it studied? Should we just Fahrenheit-451 this drivel? I think so!
4.0 out of 5 stars
subtexts give women options,
By A Customer
This review is from: Hope Leslie: or, Early Times in the Massachusetts (Paperback)
Written in the early 19th century and portraying the New England Puritan lives of the late 17th century, Sedgwick creates multiple patterns for what women can be, maneuvering between what is "appropriate" behavior according to men and the church and what is the motivation of the heart. Hope Leslie, the eponymous character, is almost always motivated by her heart rather than the rules of Puritan New England, and this lands her in all kinds of trouble. Still, her heart wins almost everyone despite her breaking of rules. Catherine Maria Sedgwick offended readers from the West when this was published because they felt her representation of Indians, through her female character, was too noble. But for women reading the novel today, almost 200 years later, the inspiration of this book lies in the many female characters, all of which represent some "pattern" or model that individual women may find themselves identifying with. There is not ONE model of womanhood, femaleness, but many. Interestingly, there are two women blown up on a ship near the end of the book. One is given a funeral ceremony (although she was Catholic, not Puritan, masqueraded as a male, and lived with a male lover unmarried); the other woman is never missed by anyone. Reading to find out who and why is worth the ride. Enjoy the book!
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