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Cornelius Mathews : a study of his depiction of Native Americans in post-Jacksonian America

First, in the early Behemoth: the Legend of the Mound-builders (1839), Mathews invents the figure of a colossal, mammoth-like creature, which is captured and destroyed by an ancient American civilization. The author reads this figure as emblematic of the struggle of Native Americans against oppressive government policy. This novel also engages contemporary notions of ancient civilizations in America.

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  • "First, in the early Behemoth: the Legend of the Mound-builders (1839), Mathews invents the figure of a colossal, mammoth-like creature, which is captured and destroyed by an ancient American civilization. The author reads this figure as emblematic of the struggle of Native Americans against oppressive government policy. This novel also engages contemporary notions of ancient civilizations in America."@en
  • "This study examines the literary career of Cornelius Mathews and focuses on his portrayal of Native Americans. When placed in the context of Post-Jacksonian politics and American culture, Mathews's work reflects cultural anxieties over anti-Indian government policies and generally refuses to demonize or romanticize Native American characters."@en
  • "In Wakondah, the Master of Life (1841), an epic poem about the Native American "Master of Life," the author reveals the difficulties of the Euro-American imagination in appropriating Native American myth. Mathews describes a fallen Native American god, who laments the erasure of Native Americans from their lands. Subsequently, the author reads differing notions of property and social relations in Big Abel and the Little Manhattan (1845), a novel in which a descendant of the Dutch colonizers and a Native American walk through Manhattan and divide up its real estate between them."@en
  • "Next, Mathews explores the ideology of family, community and identity in Moneypenny or the Heart of the World (1849--50), a novel that includes Native American characters beyond easy, popular stereotypes. Here, the author considers this text's relationship to popular culture (including P. T. Barnum's museum) and the doctrine of Manifest Destiny."@en
  • "Finally, this study turns to Mathews's relationship to the early ethnography of Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, who compiled and published Native American oral narratives. Mathews edits a selection of these tales in a collection titled The Indian Fairy Book (1856-82). His prefaces for the editions emphasize the mythological and romance elements of the tales in direct contradiction to Schoolcraft's insistence on ethnographic "truth." Faced with the realities of several historical atrocities, Mathews retreats to an idealized world of myth and fairy tale. But during much of his career, he offers readings of the predicament of Native Americans that are flawed yet more culturally significant than his literary output first suggests."@en

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  • "History"@en
  • "Dissertations, Academic"@en
  • "Criticism, interpretation, etc"@en

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  • "Cornelius Mathews : a study of his depiction of Native Americans in post-Jacksonian America"@en
  • "Cornelius Mathews: A study of his depiction of Native Americans in post-Jacksonian America"@en

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