SOURCE: “Conscious Art in Bradford's History of Plymouth Plantation,” in New England Quarterly, Vol. 1, 1928, pp. 133-57.

In the following essay, the critic discusses the “plain style” of Of Plymouth Plantation, highlighting the techniques the author employed and the literary influences on the work to argue that Bradford's seemingly artless prose was achieved through careful design.

Those who have hitherto made a detailed critical study of William Bradford's History of Plymouth Plantation have been for the most part historians whose primary interest, naturally, is rather in what Bradford says than in his manner of saying it. Those who have concerned themselves at all with his prose have been content with general remarks about its plainness, sobriety, vividness, and power. It has been most common to compare his language to that of the Bible and Pilgrim's Progress.¹

Bradford's indebtedness to the English translation of the Bible is clear enough. He...