Conquest and Reclamation in the Transatlantic Imagination : The Amerindian Fictions of Henty, Haggard, and Griffith

This book examines the imperial spectacles and startling reversals of fortune related in William H. Prescott's __History of the Conquest of Mexico__ (1843) and __History of the Conquest of Peru__ (1847), and investigates how these accounts inspired fictional adaptations by George A. Henty, H. Rider Haggard, and George Griffith. The revision of history in the Amerindian adventure both entertained young transatlantic audiences and was a vehicle to attract tourism and investment in countries such as Mexico and Peru. Henty, Haggard, and Griffith, moreover, used their tales of adventure as a platform to impart British values to their readers. Such values compel the characters and narrators of the novels discussed to act as cultural mediators, to acquire indigenous languages and adopt native ways of being, and, in several of the romance adventures under consideration, to marry Mexican or Incan noblewomen. Part I, Conquest, examines George Henty’s __By Right of Conquest: Or, With Cortez in Mexico__ (1891), H. Rider Haggard’s __Montezuma’s Daughter__ (1893), and George Griffith’s __Virgin of the Sun: A Tale of the Conquest of Peru__ (1898). Part II, Reclamation, argues that English re-writings of history work to eclipse the Spanish in Haggard’s __Virgin the Sun__ (1922), Henty’s __Treasure of the Incas__ (1902) and Griffith’s __Romance of Golden Star__ (1897). Cover Half Title Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents List of illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction Part I Conquest Chapter 1 The Rewards of Adventure in Henty’s By Right of Conquest: Or, with Cortez in Mexico (1891) Chapter 2 Haggard’s Montezuma’s Daughter (1893) as a memoir of the Spanish conquest Chapter 3 ‘I was there’: George Griffith’s trek on the Inca trail and Virgin of the Sun: A Tale of the Conquest of Peru (1898) Part II Reclamation Chapter 4 Eclipsing the Spanish in Haggard’s Virgin of the Sun (1922) Chapter 5 The Rewards of Speculation and the Promise of Development in Henty’s Treasure of the Incas (1902) Chapter 6 The Campaign of Reclamation in George Griffith’s Romance of Golden Star (1897) Epilogue: Conquest and Reclamation in the Transatlantic Imagination: The Amerindian Fictions of Henty, Haggard, and Griffith Index