Pocahontas: The Life and the Legend

"Sets the record straight in almost every instance. . . . Pocahontas is an outstanding book--by far the most sensible and complete to date."--Book World

The amazing story and alluring personality of Pocahontas (1595-1617) have endured the enlargement of legend and the distortions of time, as if waiting for Mossiker's skill, scholarship, and sensitivity to reveal Pocahontas as she was. This biography illuminates the dual world within which she struggled to identify herself, and her enormous impact on its leading figures: the first encounters and skirmishes between Indians and Englishmen in 1607; Pocahontas's dramatic rescue of Captain John Smith and her later abduction; her marriage to the Father of Tobacco, John Rolfe; the fateful voyage to England and her early death. The book also examines the myths and commercialization that have entombed Pocahontas through the centuries. In absorbing detail this vivid biography resurrects the real Pocahontas and unveils the uses-noble and ignoble-America has made of her.


About the Author
Frances Mossiker is the author of many highly praised books, including Napoleon and Josephine and The Affair of the Poisons.