William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation:

Book 1: Puritan immigration. He wants to legitimize his role as the original settler of English colonies. He tries to write a history of origins because all the communities need a story to know who they are. It is a summary of the incidents that took place until the moment they arrived to the colony (during the crossing of the Atlantic since they left England). He is legitimizing these Puritans as the original people.

Book 2: Bradford realizes that this utopian dream is dump, that this idea is broken > how the construction of a society through a broken society?

William Bradford tells the separation between Catholics and Puritans in his first book. > The more you suffer, the better, because you prove your faith with affliction (suffering is good for them> són un poc masoques).

Bradford uses typology > the Puritans legitimize themselves as the two children of God. He thinks he is rewriting the Bible, that is why they (Puritans) always speak the way they do: God, God, God, God, God, God, God (till getting sick).

They establish a kind of parallelism with the Old Testament > they need a Moses who saves them from slavery. The Promised Land is America, it is created by God for them, it is waiting for them to come (expressament per a ells). > Children of God (like Messiahs who have to take their civilization, religion and so on around the world).

Justification of why they have to leave the Low Countries (Chapter 4).

When he compares, Puritans are always better, THE BEST.

In page 27 we appreciate the beginning of the idea that they couldn't live in England. Bradford tries to justify why they left that country. They had a lot of work to do. Puritans has to move to prevent their children to become corrupted by the environment.

In page 39 (chapter IX) there's two parts: the first one takes place in the mid of the Atlantic, while the second one is about their arrival to the New World. Bradford described a lot of troubles through the waters in other to appreciate "the favour of God". He dramatizes the travel: God blesses America, his children. Whatever happens is because God's providence, no faith. There's no way to survive the high waters except the faith or the Will of God. Don't fuck the puritans or you'll have a horrible death: that's the case of the young sailor who makes fun of puritans. > He has to dramatize their trip to make the lecturer know about the hand of God (there are strong winds and other natural disasters but they are still alive, because God wants them to be alive). > God bless America. ALWAYS. ALWAYS WITH THEM. Whatever it happens here, it is God’s providence.

In page 42 he asks the readers to stop reading and think about the magnitude of their trail. He uses comparisons to show how the puritans are always the best: they were alone in the New Land (no mercy or kindness from the 'barbarians').

In page 51 starts the Book II, written in the 1640s. It isn't a book of origins, but a more realistic chronicle: what it was really happening in the colony? What happened when their mission was put in practice? The truth is that many people became corrupted. Bradford then was older and completely shocked and disappointed by what he had around: a case of bestiality, people having business with the Indians, starving, corruption and degradation in the colony and so on. He's trying to show readers how his dream failed and he had to confront reality (that's the opposite of what happens in Book I).

In page 55, Bradford points that Thomas Morton represented the major danger for the colony. He was an Anglican, and Puritans were extremely intolerant to people who is different, especially about religion. Discerning wasn't allowed. Uniformity of opinion was obligatory. Fortunately, Thomas Morton rewrote Bradford's text, so we can compare both. He's described by Bradford as having no respect for anyone, as a drunker (drinking was very condemned by the Puritans) who had a lot of vices. He was a synonymous of moral corruption. Morton became an embodiment of the worst fears of the Puritans.

In page 60 Bradford talks about the prosperity of the colony.

Finally in the last paragraphs of page 71 he concludes his narration as an old man disappointed, a man who realized the pain of the reality. Here we can appreciate the idea of questioning the ideals of the American Dream.

For Bradford, America is far from being a locus amoenus. It is not a beautiful place for him, but a terrible one (wildness for him). > Different from the other writers who have said something about America.

Puritans bring civilization > They can on this way justify their colonization and the bad manners they had with Americans, because Americans were not humans > Puritans with an errant into the wildness (they have a mission in the wildness). > They think they are better because they think they have an errant (God want them to help American people).

They are alone with their mission, but they success.

Book 1: No reality.

Book 2: Too much reality perhaps. Chronicle. Idea about the colony VS reality (contrast between the ream they had about their mission and the nightmare plenty of corruption, desolation and so on that they found there) > Puritan utopian.

Book 2 is much more realistic: Bestiality (zoofília) and sodomize > Punished by the law of the Bible > People watched doing it are killed > public execution to keep control in the colony.