In Allegories of Encounter, Andrew Newman explores captivity narratives as literacy events using case studies from Marry Rowlandson to John Marrant. Newman takes a necessarily multidisciplinary approach to render his analysis a kind of literary historicism. He does note the common criticisms of such an approach, particularly that the “evidence is often thesis driven” overlooking conflicting data that would undermine the conclusion (194). However, it seems in this case, the benefits outweigh the risks. The text can focus narrowly on a specific set of data and - slowly, carefully, deliberately - build a thesis from the evidence.
The main thrust of Newman’s argument is that by looking at written texts, particularly The Bible, in Indian captivity narratives reveals “as much about settler-colonial literacy and discursive practices as vice versa” (194). He pairs narratives to highlight the comparisons between them, i.e. Protestant Mary Rowlandson is paired with Jesuit Isaac Jogues and, in one of the most interesting chapters, John Williams is paired with his daughter Eunice, who is adopted into the tribe. The captives' and captors' relationships to books begins to articulate standards for the captivity genre, beginning with Rowlandson’s identification with Bible verses. But more than that, Newman pays special attention to the material object of the book. He touches on the trope of the talking book in his consideration of John Marrant, which looks toward the book as a physical object. He also looks at the gifting of books from native captors to their white captives. This suggests that both sides of the relationship recognized the importance of the physical text; unfortunately, this section of the text seems less substantiated and based more strongly on inference than evidence.