Pocahontas is not simply a historical figure-she is a Disney icon, part of American mythology and its self-concept of what constitutes its early heritage. But Camilla Townsend suggests that the image of the native girl, begging with her father Powhatan to free the white man has no basis in fact, and is entirely a creation of the self-mythologizing of John Smith in his memoirs of his leadership of the Jamestown colony. Townsend hopes to paint a truer portrait of a historical figure we know little about and also to use the life of Pocahontas to debunk some of the most cherished myths that Americans have about their national origin.
             Pocahontas' plea to her father was not a spontaneous act of affection, but was part of the traditional rituals of her tribe. Smith and Powhatan were engaged a traditional friendship ceremony that made Smith the chief's new 'son.' Smith's life, in short, was never in danger, nor was Pocahontas' action displeasing or surprising to her father. In fact, it was quite the opposite. She was always helpful to her father, acting as a translator between the whites and her own people, rather than a genuine sympathizer with the customs and manners of Europe.
             Perhaps the saddest myth about Pocahontas debunked by the book, however, is not her relationship with Smith, but that of her loveless marriage to John Rolfe. It was common practice for warring tribes to intermarry, to mitigate the dangers that could be done by potential enemies. Powhatan was a canny negotiator, and he knew that the colonists posed a risk to native authority. Pocahontas' marriage was supposed to be a favorable alliance between whites and natives, where she would act as an emissary, but the young woman quickly sickened and died, married to a man in an unfamiliar land, where she was forced to abide by unfamiliar customs and to constantly speak a foreign language, living amongst strangers. Her husband did not...