Natures Place In Literature

5 Pages 1287 Words

When Frederick Jackson Turner announced in 1893 that “the
American character did not spring full-blown from the Mayflower,”
but that “it came out of the forest and gained new strength each
time it touched the frontier, “his speech punctuated nearly three
centuries of examinations into the American wilderness. From
Jamestown and Plymouth Plantation to the Louisiana Purchase of
1803 and the subsequent expedition of Lewis and Clark, to Turner’s
“Frontier Thesis” at the Colombian Exposition of 1893, the geography
and ecology of the American continent was the center of debate
among Americans. Two primary views of the wilderness were
contested: the wilderness either contained savagery and temptation
which threatened the authority of the community or it represented a
new Garden which could flourish with the proper cultivation by
European settlers. Although these contradicting views of the
wilderness shared the goal of establishing a civilization by removing
obstacles presented by the natural environment, the state of
wilderness that originally, characterized the young nation eventually
became the source of natural pride and identity for America.
William Bradford wrote about the first type of nature
previously described . In his manuscript entitled “Of Plymouth
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Plantation,” Bradford describes the Wilderness as something hideous
and desolate. He and the other settlers he was traveling with are
constantly being described as fighting the weather, Indians, and
nature by the Grace of God. Bradford sees himself as a Moses
figure. He is leading these people to the promised land. He believed
God sent them to this land, and is constantly praising Him for
delivering them from harm. Bradford states,” for summer being
done, all things stand upon them with a weather beaten face, and
the whole country full of woods and thickets, represented a wild and
savage hue” (49). The land that th...