海角大神

Empire builder: Walter Ralegh conquered in the name of his queen

Alan Gallay鈥檚 biography examines not only the colorful life of Sir Walter Ralegh but also his role in colonization.  

Walter Ralegh, the Elizabethan courtier who鈥檚 the subject of Alan Gallay鈥檚 鈥淲alter Ralegh: Architect of Empire鈥� hasn鈥檛 exactly lacked for biographies since his execution in 1618. He鈥檚 immortalized in popular imagination as the gallant who threw his cloak over a puddle so Queen Elizabeth wouldn鈥檛 muddy her leggings. His picturesque life 鈥� and particularly his role in the era鈥檚 colonization of Ireland, North America (famously sending a mission to the colony of Roanoke, Virginia), and South America (searching Venezuela for rumored heaps of gold) 鈥� has always been attractive to biographers. 鈥淲alter Ralegh: Architect of Empire鈥� follows 2018鈥檚 鈥淧atriot Or Traitor: The Life and Death of Sir Walter Ralegh鈥� by Anna Beer, for instance, which followed Raleigh Trevelyan鈥檚 640-page book from 2002.聽

鈥淎rchitect of Empire鈥� is likewise nearly 600 pages, but it distinguishes itself from the general pack through the ambition of its ideological scope. Gallay is the Lyndon B. Johnson Chair of United States History at Texas 海角大神 University, and in this book he鈥檚 far more concerned with the main enterprises of Ralegh鈥檚 life than he is with courtly swordplay or covered puddles.

Specifically, Gallay is interested in colonization and in Ralegh as one of the premier colonizers of the Elizabethan era. Ralegh was in a perfect position to organize colonies and 鈥減lantations鈥� in such places as Guiana (now Guyana), Virginia, and Ireland because, as Gallay writes, 鈥淗is star was in the ascendant鈥� in the mid-1580s. 鈥淭he queen鈥檚 granting of multiple rewards to Ralegh left no doubt that he had become her favorite.鈥�

Gallay鈥檚 book is a thorough and detailed interpretation of just what colonization meant in Elizabethan times. 鈥淎t its root, colonialism is the movement of a group of people to new lands,鈥� he writes. 鈥淚f the lands are heavily populated ... conquest must take place before colonization.鈥� Throughout his book, Gallay seeks to draw a wide line between conquest and colonization 鈥� sometimes a wider line than the facts support. 鈥淭he intent of colonization,鈥� he contends, 鈥渋s to improve one鈥檚 life and the lives of people at home 鈥� and, quite often, the people whose lands are colonized. Those intent on conquest are not colonizers.鈥�

This is rather too nice. Typically, in Elizabethan times, conquerors and colonizers were virtually indistinguishable, and despite Gallay鈥檚 claim that Ralegh 鈥渆nvisioned an empire without conquest, where the Native peoples would be full partners in the colonial enterprise,鈥� that vision never came close to the reality of the slaughter and wholesale land theft Queen Elizabeth unleashed on every patch of potentially valuable territory within her reach. This is amply demonstrated by the destruction Ralegh鈥檚 own efforts (abetted by his friend and collaborator Edmund Spenser, whose allegorical poem 鈥淭he Faerie Queene鈥� Gallay analyzes with remarkable skill) caused in Ireland鈥檚 Munster 鈥減lantation.鈥澛�

Colonization, Gallay writes a bit bloodlessly, is 鈥渁 physical process that involves movement of people and transfer of land ownership鈥� but adds that it鈥檚 also an 鈥渆thereal鈥� process in which colonizers pile fiction upon fiction in order to justify their actions. There鈥檚 quite a bit of that justifying happening in these pages.

Fortunately, the huge majority of Gallay鈥檚 narrative isn鈥檛 quite so freighted in his hero鈥檚 favor. 鈥淎rchitect of Empire鈥� is mostly a detailed and spirited chronicle of one of history鈥檚 most colorful lives. Gallay follows Ralegh鈥檚 fortunes from his youth in Devon to his adventures at the court of Elizabeth I, where his good looks and bold spirit captured the favor of the queen. He kept that favor until he impetuously married one of Elizabeth鈥檚 ladies-in-waiting and was ostracized by his jealous monarch.

His expedition to Guiana in the mid-1590s was in part a desperate effort to win back that favor, but success was fleeting in any case. After Elizabeth鈥檚 death in 1603, Ralegh鈥檚 star fell. He was falsely implicated in a plot to kill the newly installed King James, sentenced to death, reprieved, and later involved in a disastrously botched second expedition to Guiana. When the Spanish called for his death, King James (who, Gallay writes, 鈥渆yed Ralegh suspiciously鈥�) consented, and the most famous man of his day was sent to the executioner鈥檚 block.

Gallay writes about this familiar story with a great deal of fresh energy and a thorough command of his sources. His version of Walter Ralegh is a refreshingly material creature, a climber and schemer very distinct from the romanticized gallant who too often appears in biographies. This is very much a Ralegh for the anti-colonial 21st century.