Revengeful Violence – Hannah Duston’s Captivity Narative and the Puritan Paradox

Mingiuc, Andreea

doi:10.2478/v10319-012-0027-6

Abstract

The story of Hannah Duston brings forth a new image of the captive Puritan woman, one that is bearing the horrifying specter of violent revenge. The essay dwells on the captive’s way of dealing with the experience of captivity by touching upon Walter Benjamin’s approach on the matter and also by analyzing the moral paradox that arises.

References

Abbott, Mathew. 2008. “The Creature before the Law: Notes on Walter Benjamin’s Critique of Violence”. COLLOQUI Text Theory Critique, 16, pp. 80-96.
Search in Google Scholar
Arner, Robert D. 1973. “The Story of Hannah Duston: Cotton Mather to Thoreau” in American Transcendental Quarterly, 18, pp. 19-23.
Search in Google Scholar
Benjamin, Walter. 2007. “Critique of Violence” in Violence: a Reader. Eds. Bruce B. Lawrence, Aisha Karim. Duke University Press, pp. 268-285.
Search in Google Scholar
Dwight, Timothy. 1821. Travels in New England and New York. New York: S. Converse Printer.
Search in Google Scholar
Fliegelman, Jay. 1982. Prodigals and Pilgrims: The American Revolution AgainstPatriarchal Authority 750-1800. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Search in Google Scholar
“Hannah Dustin’s Letter to the Elders of the Second Church in Haverhill”. 1724. [Online]. Available: http://www.hawthorneinsalem.org/page/11866/
Search in Google Scholar
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. 1836. “The Duston Family”. The American Magazine of UsefulEntertaining Knowledge, 9, pp. 395-397.
Search in Google Scholar
Holy Bible. King James Version. 1971. Nashville: Royal Publishers, Inc.
Search in Google Scholar
Mather, Cotton. 1820. “A Notable Exploit” Magnalia Christi Americana. 1702. vol. 2.
Search in Google Scholar
New Haven: S. Converse Printer.
Search in Google Scholar
Reinwater, Catherine. 2003. “Indian Captivity Narrative” in Serafin, Steven R. and Alfred Bendixen. (Eds.). The Continuum Encyclopedia of American Literature. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group, pp. 565-567.
Search in Google Scholar
Thoreau, Henry David. 2003. A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers. The Project Gutenberg E-text: Bebook.
Search in Google Scholar
Weis, Ann-Marie. 1998. “The murderous mother and the solicitous father: Violence, Jacksonian Family Values, and Hannah Duston’s Captivity” in American StudiesInternational, 1/36, pp. 46-65.
Search in Google Scholar
Whitford, Kathryn. 1972. “Hannah Dustin: The Judgement of History” in Essex InstituteHistorical Collections, 4, pp. 304-325.
Search in Google Scholar
Whittier, John Greenleaf. 1965. Legends of New England (1831): A FacsimileReproduction. Gainesville, Florida: Scholars’ Facsimiles and Reprints.
Search in Google Scholar

Revengeful Violence – Hannah Duston’s Captivity Narative and the Puritan Paradox

Abstract

Paradigm

My account