Dr. Ramirez
Rider Haggard Montezuma's Daughter

Write for 10 minutes on Haggard's representation of adventure.

Wingfield on a quest for revenge
Parallel with Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719)
Exile: Crusoe is stuck for 28 years on an island in the Caribbean
Wingfield is stuck in Mexico for almost 20 years
Blessed w/a strong constitution
Lifeboat: woman drinks salt water
Thomas guided by reason
Life or death situations: jumping overboard, Shark attack, Plague
Once he lands, he succumbs to the insects
He has mastered his own cirumstances and then he faces the natives
Haggard depicts the danger of the New World--Mexico

Conveying of verisimilude: creating a true likeness
Haggard uses real names: Cortes, Cordova, Marina/Malinche
Represents Aztec gods--Huitzel

Characters:
Thomas Wingfield
Juan de Garcia
Andres de Fonseca
Isabella de Siguenza

The following definitions come from: http://www.poeticbyway.com/gl-t.html
and from http://www.du.edu/~ckuhn/lit/poetryfictionterms.htm

THEME: The central idea, topic, or didactic quality of a work. Sidelight: Although theme is often used interchangeably with motif, it is preferable to recognize the difference between the two terms.

Example:
One theme in Montezuma's Daughter is delay.  The first comes about with Wingfield's courting of Donna Luisa and their subsequent flight from Spain. Next, de Garcia gets away becuase Thomas delays in taking care of him; the village idiot unties him and lets him go. Likewise, Wingfield Sr. and Geoffrey just miss de Garcia as they watch his ship sail around the point. When Thomas has a run-in with de Garcia in Seville, he withholds the information from Fonseca, thinking that by waiting he is being cautious. However, this delay prevents Fonseca from helping him. Fonseca could have put an end to de Garcia and leaves to do just that, but to no avail.

Example:
Revenge is one theme in the novel. And in Thomas's quest for revenge, he repeatedly brings misfortune upon himself.  Although he is told by Fonseca, "Who are you that you should meet out vengeance on this kave de Garcia? Let him be, and he will avenge upon himself"(Haggard 70).  Even when Fonseca, who is a fortune teller, warns Thomas that he may face doom, Thomas stays on his path of revenge.

Example:
Thomas maintaining his oath is a main theme in the narrative, as revealed in the quote "Thomas has sworn an oath and he does well to keep it, for his honour is at stake"(Haggard 86).   He is given an opportunity to live a prosperous life back in England, but he refuses.  He feels he has to maintain his honor: "But I have sworn to kill him. . . and how can I break so solemn an oath? How could I sit at home in peace beneath the burden of shame?"(Haggard 70).
 

SYMBOL: Something that on the surface is its literal self but which also has another meaning or even several meanings. For example, a sword may be a sword and also symbolize justice. A symbol may be said to embody an idea. There are two general types of symbols: universal symbols that embody universally recognizable meanings wherever used, such as light to symbolize knowledge, a skull to symbolize death, etc., and constructed symbols that are given symbolic meaning by the way an author uses them in a literary work, as the white whale becomes a symbol of evil in Moby Dick.

IMAGERY, IMAGE: The elements in a literary work used to evoke mental images, not only of the visual sense, but of sensation and emotion as well. While most commonly used in reference to figurative language, imagery is a variable term which can apply to any and all components of a poem that evoke sensory experience, whether figurative or literal, and also applies to the concrete things so imaged. Sidelight: Imaginative diction transfers the poet's impressions of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch to the careful reader.     (See also Ekphrasis, Figure of Speech, Trope)

Example:
Haggard uses imagery when giving details about the "horrors of the hold" (Haggard 91) on the slave ship bound for the Caribbean. He uses the reader's sense of smell when referring to the bilge water. There are 200 slaves crammed into a space below the planks that are less than 7 feet high. There's the horrible odor of the death and sickness referred to as the Black Vomit. We can visualize the darkness since lanterns are the only means of light and are only brought in when the guards either remove the dead people or bring down food and water.  There's a tremendous sense of being uncomfortable--to put it mildly. Haggard conveys a claustrophobic feeling as Thomas is stuffed amongst all those people, some dead. There's the "terrible heat", lying in the filthy bilge water, being shackled hand and foot to the side of the ship. There's also the mouldy cakes which are the only source of food.


Chapter Overviews
Chapter V
Thomas set on avenging his mother's death
Recollection of Mr. Wingfield's flight on the Mary to England from Cadiz. 43
Contextualization of the Spanish Armada and Inquisition
Chapter VI
Thomas sets sail on the Adventuress for Spain. 45
Mr. Wingfield's repentance
Chapter VII
Andres de Fonseca takes Thomas under his tutelage, treats him like a son/nephew
Commerce in secrets and mysterious remedies
Chapter VIII
Search for answers about Juan--meeting of grandmother's old servant. 59
Encounter between Juan and Isabella--1517
Chapter IX
Thomas becomes rich through his inheritance--reveals Haggard's fantasy of rich old men adopting young British upstarts
Repetition of the biblical saying, "Vengeance is mine."
Chapter X
Reveals a sensational and malicious view of Catholicism
The entombing of Isabella de Siguenza
Having been passing as Fonseca's nephew, D'Aila, Thomas dons the robes of an  "accursed" monk. 114
He decides against his better reason to pursue Juan de Garcia rather than returning to his beloved Lily.
As compensation, he leaves Lily the interest of the rent to be collected on his lands
Chapter XI
Thomas embarks on the Five Wounds to Hispaniola (Haiti and Dominican Republic) and passes himself this time as a Merchant. 123
This ship founders, sinks and Thomas and his counterparts find refuge in a smaller boat that is eventually picked up by another Carak bound for the Caribbean.
De Garcia exposes Thomas as an Englishman and he gives him to another Spaniard who casts Wingfield with the dying slaves.
The notion of disguise works both ways for Thomas and De Garcia, as the latter poses as Sarceda. 128

Chapter XII
Much of the tyrannous crew dies of the plague, leaving Thomas to fend for himself
Thomas engages de Garcia in a duel, conveys Isabella's last words, and then jumps overboard
He finds a barrel and bails it out so that it floats (the meal acting as ballast)
He fights sharks, thirst, sun exposure and fatigue until he is delivered upon the breakers of land