The fact that women participated in the piratical movement helps solidify Rediker’s theory that there was great social disparity between the classes.

An invaluable element to his work was his research on women as pirates which was truly fascinating as the accounts seemed to hold up throughout the historical record (105). He writes to explain the environment in which piracy was fostered and to depict it as the social reaction that it was as opposed to the random trend of “adventure seeking” which it is often depicted as in popular culture.Īs one reviewer very accurately points out “the author’s skillful use of metropolitan and colonial newspaper articles, travel accounts, religious sermons, official correspondence, state papers, admiralty records, and other court documents (many of which are carried over from Captain Charles Johnsons General History of Pyrates)” tremendously helps to reign in his thesis. Rediker’s narrative should not simply be written off as wholly preposterous, however, for he does make an effort to point out that his observations work to summarize the era as a whole. The colonial age, most assuredly, did not bring out the best in imperial minded, capitalist hubs including Britain, Portugal, France and the Netherlands nevertheless, memorializing the age of piracy as a movement that should be associated with principled resistance, is a dangerous connection to make. Rediker’s thesis is best summarized by the last line of the book wherein Rediker commands: “These outlaws (pirates) led audacious, rebellious lives, and we should remember them as long as there are powerful people and oppressive circumstances to be resisted (176)”.

As opposed to discussing the nature of piracy from a neutral standpoint within the context of colonialism, the book works to vindicate pirates and piracy as a seemingly noble deviation from a system which was (truthfully) drenched in corruption and abuse. Like the quote above, Villains of All Nations seems to feed existing stereotypes and caricatures regarding pirates in popular culture today. That being said, Rediker, writes with an innate sense of purpose and a pervasive perspective, an agenda, if you will, which every reader should be cautioned about prior to or after reading the work.

Marcus Rediker’s Villains of All Nations is undoubtedly an entertaining read for those interested in further understanding how the age of piracy developed and fit into the larger context of the colonial age and the Atlantic trade system.

Marcus rediker villains of all nations