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Yankee Ingenuity Character Analysis

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How is one with Yankee Ingenuity escapes from being a prisoner of war living and surviving on the enemy's land? In Herman Melville’s Israel Potter, the protagonist represents Yankee Ingenuity because he always manages to escape from adversity. Melville exemplifies this throughout the novel on how the main character, Israel, faces and deals with adversity.

Israel Potter joins the American forces and goes to war with the British, where he is captured and then escapes, which he lives as a prisoner of war in the enemy land. In the start of the book, Israel was battling at Bunker Hill and was badly wounded. Fortunately, he was able to escape and recover from the wounds. After recovering, he rejoined and boarded an American ship. Later at sea, the ship was captured by the enemy’s British ship and Israel was captured and taken into prison and was brought to England. He thought of many tactics until he came up with a tactic that will work to escape from the British ship. With careful planning, he patiently waited until he heard the drunken soldiers fall into a deep sleep and finally finds his chance to escape. Then he manages to escape from …show more content…

He boards an enemy ship and he was being interrogated. Some of the questions that the lieutenant asked Israel are where the ship had stopped, what he had been doing on the boat, and if he knew any of the names of the people on the ship. Luckily, he knew a lot of things about the British because of his adventure in England and he pretends to be British under a different name. He uses his knowledge and finds his way to answer and lie to the lieutenant without getting himself caught in a lie. Israel shows Yankee Ingenuity because he uses his intelligence, knowledge, and creativity to disguise his Yankee identity by pretending to be a British under a different name and pretending to be on the ship the whole

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