Savage Kingdom
Virginia and The Founding of English America (Text Only)
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- $25.99
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- $25.99
Publisher Description
Epic history of the first Virginia Colony and the true story of Pocahontas, to coincide with the colony’s 400th anniversary in 2007.
Four centuries ago, and fourteen years before the Mayflower, a group of men-led by a one-armed ex-pirate, an epileptic aristocrat, a reprobate cleric and a government spy-left London aboard a fleet of three ships to start a new life in America. They arrived in Virginia in the spring of 1607, and set about trying to create a settlement on a tiny island in the James River. Despite their shortcomings and against the odds, they built Jamestown, a ramshackle outpost which laid the foundations of the British Empire and the United States of America.
Drawing on new discoveries, neglected sources and manuscript collections scattered across the world, Savage Kingdom challenges the textbook image of Jamestown as a mere money-making venture. It reveals a reckless, daring enterprise led by outcasts of the old world who found themselves interlopers in a new one. It charts their journey into a beautiful landscape and sophisticated culture that they found both ravishing and alien, which they yearned to possess, but threatened to destroy.
It shows them trying to escape the 'Savage Kingdom' that their homeland had become, and endeavoring to build 'one of the most glorious nations under the sun'.
An intimate story in an epic setting, Woolley shows how the land of Pocahontas came to be drawn into a new global order, reaching from London to the Orinoco Delta, from the warring kingdoms of Angola to the slave markets of Mexico, from the gates of the Ottoman Empire to the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Note that it has not been possible to include the same picture content that appeared in the original print version.
Reviews
‘With imagination, restraint and delicacy Woolley crafts a narrative both finely-grained and meticulously plotted – a fitting memorial for the 400th anniversary of Jamestown's foundation. As in his previous works, the lightest touch reanimates the past, evoking and elucidating equally.‘ Sunday Telegraph
‘Woolley…tells the story lucidly, elegantly and with a command of the broad sweep of the early 17th century and the fine details of human behaviour.’ The Guardian
‘It's fascinating to get access to a society in which individuals make an impact…for those on the ground one thing followed another and the best thing about this book is the way it gives a sense of how hectic and dangerous that felt.’ Daily Telegraph
‘Benjamin Woolley tells this story in direct, engaging prose…his book is a delight.’ The Spectator
About the author
Benjamin Woolley is an award-winning writer and broadcaster. He is the author of the best-selling ‘The Queen's Conjuror: The Life and Magic of Dr John Dee.’ His first book, ‘Virtual Worlds’ was short-listed for the Rhone-Poulenc prize and has been translated into eight languages. He has also written and presented for the BBC's ‘The Late Show’, including programmes on the philosophy of Michel Foucault and the architecture of Tokyo. He has won the Arts Journalist of the Year award and an Emmy for his commentary for Discovery's 'Three Minutes to Impact'. He lives in London.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This highly readable account of the founding of Jamestown moves from the English throne to the daily struggles of the colony's first settlers and the experience of Virginia's Indians as their relations with colonists became increasingly strained. Here are the famous tales from early Virginia, like Pocahontas's marriage to John Rolfe. But well-known explorers sit cheek by jowl with fascinating, lesser-known people, such as the colonists' wives, who consulted an astrologer to reassure themselves about their husbands' fate on the open seas. Woolley emphasizes both the financial and religious aims of colonization: English backers expected to get rich on the bounty the settlers would uncover and produce (though the first ships of wood and iron ore sent back disappointed the London Company). But Englishmen also saw Virginia as a "religious mission," an opportunity to spread Protestantism abroad. Woolley persuasively argues that the settlers' aggressive response to a 1623 Indian attack became the "defining moment" in the history of English settlement of Virginia it was through this event, more than any other, that the colonists articulated their connection to their new land and "crafted and honed their American identity." Woolley blends nuanced analysis with fast-paced narrative. 16 pages of color illus.
