Bernard Rosenthal

Tituba's Story

witchcraft is historically significant, for it confirmed witchcraft activity in the community.2 Although not the only slave caught up in the 1692 episode, Tituba has a unique role in the literature about Salem, for her story has taken on nothing short of mythical dimensions. As in the originary myth of the Fall, a woman, here a dark-skinned one, has carried the burden of having introduced sin and loss. As the events of 1692 unfolded, interest in Tituba receded. New charges, new confessions, and a new cast of participants emerged to catch the interest of the community. Following the record of circumstances surrounding her admission of guilt, very little contemporary commentary appeared on Tituba, the most significant being assertions that her confessions were prompted by beatings from her master, the Reverend Parris, and that she herself was afflicted by witches.3

City of Nature: Journeys to Nature in the Age of American Romanticism.

This book reexamines traditional assumptions about early American attitudes toward nature. It also reopens and redefines the relationships of nature and civilization in the previous century, and in so doing, offers todays reader an insight into the basis for some contemporary attitudes toward the environment. The works of major and minor American writers are considered.