Kenneth Roberts

[Valandil]

I'm more into discovering authors from some years back than new ones. Kenneth Roberts wrote from the late 1920's into the 1950's - stories about early America: settings from the Colonial period into the early years of our country. His stories center around his native area in Maine.

I recently noticed a few of his books together at the Library - and finally checked one out. His most famous is Northwest Passage (made into a movie in the 1950's - and the one I noticed - set at the time of the French and Indian Wars - 1750's), but instead of that, I checked out Rabble in Arms (set in 1776).

Almost halfway through and enjoying it. Will probably check out another one or two after I finish this.

Has anyone here read anything by him?

[Valandil]

I finished Rabble in Arms just over a week ago, and am halfway through Northwest Passage. I think the movie of the latter was based entirely from the first half - Book 1. There's a Book 2 which I'm just about to start.

Strongly recommend both. There are two others he wrote which I want to read, but I don't think the local library has either. So I'll need to look elsewhere.

[Valandil]

Finished Northwest Passage about a week before Christmas. As I said, enjoyed both of these books by Roberts.

Both present a very positive account of someone who had become vilified in American society. In Rabble in Arms, it was Benedict Arnold. In Northwest Passage, it was Robert Rogers. I understand that may be a common approach by Ken Roberts. In fact, he's written another one, which my library doesn't have and I now want to read - about an English Loyalist at the time of the American Revolution - Oliver Wiswell. In this case, I don't know if there's a historical basis for the character, as there is for both Arnold and Rogers, or if he is fictitious, but representative of Loyalists at the time.

We don't see this in our country today - or even any memory of it - but I've gathered that in our early years, there was some "national guilt" to be worked through about how Loyalists were treated before and during the American Revolution. It's pretty well spelled out in the first of the Leatherstocking Tales (written, I think, in 1820's or so) by James Fenimore Cooper, The Pioneers. In fact - that's a really good read. Especially shocking to anyone who has read the most famous, Last of the Mohicans - which he wrote second, but which is set about 35 years earlier.